berts

i am starting to train for hills and wanted to know if anyone has an off-the-shelf hill training program.
my goal is to reach my personal hill climbing max in 2 months

i live not too far from a 2.5 km hill with ca. 5-13% grade, I also am within driving distance of more serious climbs, 900 meter climb in 24 km etc.

terrymorse 

Off the shelf 2-month program, no. But I can tell you what I do. I climb a lot of hills at a variety of different intensities.

Here are the workouts that I use throughout the year:

Strength work: 2-3 hours climbing in a bigger than normal gear, in the saddle.
Power work: 3-3.5 hours climbing at tempo pace (76%-85% of max HR).
Power intervals: intervals performed near lactate threshold (86%-93% of max HR). Length of interval from 15-20 minutes, 60-90 minutes total time near threshold.
Endurance work: 4-7 hours over varied terrain, just below tempo pace.

I'll do one strength ride per week, only early in the season. Power work I'll do once or twice, power intervals once, endurance ride once. The other days of the week are recovery rides.

The best climbers have the highest power-to-weight ratios. If you want to climb faster, work to increase your power and decrese your weight. A good bike fit helps, also, since it allows you to put more force into the pedals.

Most training programs will have some form of these workouts in them. You can tailor them to suit your personal needs. If your local hill is only 2.5k, you can turn hill repeats into intervals. Warm up first, blast up to the top, coast back down, repeat. Some people claim that short anaerobic intervals help improve aerobic climbing performance, but I'm not convinced. I haven't incorporated them yet, maybe because they're painful.

Crack'n'fail

Climb, my friend. Climb. There is no quick routine to get better. As with other riding you need base miles. Climbing miles and miles at moderate intensity. Then start to climb with speed (aka intervals) etc.