Every accomplishment starts with a decision to try

Monday 7th September 4 mile walk with the poor tortured dog who does not know if he's coming or going, who are all these people in MY house??! Went to St Catherines Park where was so peaceful and quiet I could actually hear the leaves falling from the trees.... bliss.

6.5 miles @10:14, my first ventolin aided run - crikey I can't quite believe the difference even on on an easy run like this. Obviously I was still out of breath but was able to take lovely long inhales & exhales instead of the short fast huffing and puffing I do. Loved this run, legs felt great if a smidge tired, lungs felt super, day off work, sun shining zippity doo dah zippity day

based on a few conversations recently I've gone back to look at my paces, specifically I suppose my easy pace which I'm possibly constantly running a little on the fast side. There are 2 calculators used regularly here, McMillan and Jack Daniels. Based on Saturdays 10K time, these give me quite different results, I've also thrown Clearliers calculator from the DCM graduates thread into the mix too. I am going to train by HR again for the coming months so have included some calculations for that too. Here's what I get.

type of run McMillan pace Mc M % of HR JD pace jd % of HR Clearliers HR table

Easy 9:33-10:30 60-85% (111-157) 10:35-11:11 65-70% (120-130) 129-149
Long 9:36-10:51 60-85% (111-157) not listed
Recovery 10:35-11:24 60-70% (111-130) not listed <140
Tempo intervals (8-15 mins) 8:27-8:46 87-92% (161-170) 8:51 88-92% (163-170)
Tempo Run (10-40 mins) 8:35-8:53 85-90% (157-166) not listed 149-168
Steady (25-90 mins) 8:56-9:20 83-87% (153-161)
Marathon not listed 9:26 80-90% (148-166) 146-162

Its more than a little confusing... just taking easy runs, the 3 calculators give different highest HR% ranging from 130-157, so which one is right? Oddly the faster the run the closer the calculators are together.

Does anyone use any other form of calculation? I think I will take out McMillan altogether as the ranges are very wide and just work between JD & Clearliers figures. When you're training for shorter stuff does easy pace matter quite as much as when you're training for marathon/half marathon? or are the negative effect exactly the same?
The plan for the next few weeks contains one speed session (400's/800's), one steady or tempo run and the rest I'm assuming are easy pace.

Bungy Girl wrote: »

That is quite a difference! Can't help I'm afraid, I use the JD/vDot numbers as a guideline for long runs but tend to rely on perceived effort as most of my runs would be off road. When I do a run on path or tarmac the pace usually ends up faster than the recommended range. So I ignore it .

Sorry, I am no help, other than to say there's clearly more than one right answer - which are you more comfortable with using, HR or pace ? I'd imagine trying to keep both in check would drive you nuts, no ?

:D seems to work for you though!!

am happy to use HR but the differences in range in that too are considerable so just want to find out which one is right or how best to find that out.

Bungy Girl wrote: »

I think the Hadd article (long, but worth reading) might offer some assistance. I know I've seen a link to it in various threads. Yaboya might be the person to ask ?

menoscemo wrote: »

Hadd makes it nice and simple.
He gets you to pick a HR about 50 BPM below your max and you do all your easy/recovery runs at that HR.
As your fitness improves you will start running faster at that HR and will also notice that you don't have to slow down throughout your run to keep the HR down.
Basically you have to just display HR on your watch and stick to it rigidly (+ or - a few BPM as you go up/down hills etc). It's a bit tedious but if you are doing a mixture of pace runs and sessions, it's not a bad rule to follow for your easy/recovery runs.

thank you both , am reading through Hadd now, certainly lots of detail in his article, interestingly my max - 50 is 135 which is doable with some monitoring, I think my avg HR on easy runs currently comes in around 139.

menoscemo wrote: »

That sounds good, but bear in mind Hadd wants your HR to be 135 or less at all times, so you average would normally be a little below that (first mile or two takes a while to build up to 135).
So if your 1st mile is 120 and you last mile is 150 your average would be 135 but that's not what he wants.
It can be difficult to keep running at that low a HR towards the end of a run because even though your pace might not go down your HR will normally go up (cardiac drift). But by continuing to do the runs as he prescribes you will begin to eliminate cardiac drift and you endurance will improve.

FWIW I'd say there is no harm in you doing your easy at Max HR minus 45 (i.e. 140) if 135 is too hard.

yes true, so he's saying it should be 135 or lower at all times, so in the beginning I'll actually need to decrease my pace as the run goes on to keep the HR right, is that the right? (although 140 would be easier to manage).

Tuesday 8th September 6 x 400 @ 5k pace with 3 min recoveries. Headed up to the bypass for this solo as the club sessions are getting longer as they get closer to the marathon. Turned the watch to KM(!) so I could properly measure out 400m. Also kept the warm up and cool down HR to below 140 (although thought I was keeping it below 135 till I saw the stats). Garmin connect kindly converted everything back to miles when I uploaded it

warm up 2.15 miles @ 11.20, avg HR 129 (122, 130, 132, 134) max HR 139

rep 1, pace 7:57, fast but not flat out, (measuring distance) - maxHR 168
rep 2, pace 7.11, a smidge fast with uphill drag - max HR 177
rep 3, pace 7:04, way to fast! max HR 173
rep 4, pace 7.20, better max HR 174
rep 5, pace 7.24, max HR 172
rep 6 pace 7.27, max HR 174 - was feeling the earlier reps by now

cool down, 1.54 miles @ 11.35 avg hr 133 (133, 134, 132) max hr 140

found keeping the HR low on the warm up tough enough as the run went on but managed it and even though the pace is ridiculously slow I need to stick with this for a while & be consistent. The speed part was very enjoyable but body was feeling it towards the lasts couple of reps.

I didnt take the inhaler before I left because I want to measure next weeks session against this: no inhaler V inhaler. Plenty of coughing & wheezing at the end of each rep this eve! Also too cold to be out in a singlet while jogging/walking recoveries...

annapr wrote: »

Good going on the session FD. Interesting discussion re. your paces... should make a difference to race performance if you nail that.

yeah I'm still working my way through the Hadd article, sorry I hadn't read it before this but better later than never! hopefully it won't take too long for my paces to increase at the lower HR.

Wednesday 9th September 30 mins Strength training followed by stretches & foam rolling

Thursday 10th September 30 min tempo split 10 warm up / 10 tempo / 10 cool down
kept the max HR below 135 for the 10 min warm up, found this easier to do today, didn't monitor anything for the 10 min tempo as I'd forgotten to switch the watch back to miles and the pace it was giving me meant nothing :rolleyes: I don't speak KM's... so just ran hard for 10 mins and it worked out at avg pace 8:40. Harder to keep the HR below 135 for the run home presumably because it had just been raised, the avg is 133/134/136 but the max is 146/146/145.

aquinn wrote: »

You took the ventolin?

eh, no, I forgot

menoscemo wrote: »

Yeah definitely it's harder to keep it low after a tempo.
TBH If I were you I'd only worry about keeping the HR down on easy and long runs.

thanks yeah was wondering about that, actually just re-read the instructions for this run and it says to run it completely by feel :rolleyes:

hillsiderunner wrote: »

Good luck! (for the sub-25)

Ah no not tomorrow!! But thanks