Monday night I had to dust off my bike trainer for my Tuesday morning ride. I had considered going to spin class during lunch on Tuesday, but I had a meeting scheduled during the class time. So, I had to resort to the trainer. While I don’t think I could do more than an hour on the trainer, overall it’s not too bad. Honestly, it’s the only time I have to sit and watch the news uninterrupted. The trainer is a little noisy and I don’t want to wake up the rest of the house, so I turn on the closed caption and spin away! 45 minutes on the schedule in Zone 2 with my cadence at 85+…unfortunately, I just ordered the cadence sensor for my bike and I still hadn’t figured out the whole heart-rate monitor thingy, so I had no idea of my zone or cadence. Ugh!
Lucky for me, the Hubby helped me figure out the HR monitor before my run this morning. (Yes, I realize it's not exactly rocket science!) I was hoping my Wfit peep, Julie, would be meeting me for at least a portion of the scheduled 6 miles….but, she couldn’t make it, so it was just me and the roads. (That and several rabbits, stars, the newspaper dude and a few other crazy early-morning runners.) This was another “easy” run, or as Coach typed into Training Peaks, “EASY!” run. My heart rate was supposed to be in Zone 2 (126-146) and I was supposed to maintain my easy pace per McMillan (11:29 – 11:59). For some reason, I have no problem running slower in a marathon, but I have been running my shorter runs much faster for the past couple of years. Part of that “to run faster, you have to run faster” mentality, I guess. Yes, I had easier days, but those runs were rarely over an 11 minute/mile pace (unless it was 100+ degrees outside with 100% humidity)and usually in the low 10s or maybe even the high 9s. Yes, I know you have to also run slower to get faster, but this is sooooo new to me – forcing myself to go slower than slow – and it’s hard. I had to take a couple of walk breaks to get my heart rate down and to slow my pace a bit. Overall, I never got under an average 153 HR or an average 11:28 pace. I guess I need to keep working on this. Can I just say that I am sooooo, soooo happy to have a Tempo run on my schedule next week? It's the little things!
I am soooo looking forward to getting my cadence sensor for my bike! Also, this weekend I am going to buy fins, a kickboard and some paddles – yay me! Next up, I am finally going to get a new saddle for the bike. I am still using the factory saddle and it’s time to upgrade to something more comfy! Yes, this is exactly why I am never at the mall buying trendy, cute new work clothes – all my extra $ goes toward miscellaneous tri stuff. :-)
Do you follow the suggested paces from McMillan? Do you train using your HR? How slow are your "easy" runs? Or, do you use other methods for training?
5 comments:
I did some slooow running as part of HR training about a year ago, and I do think it helped. Although I'm with you, it felt really slow.
The thing I don't get is HR and paces. I could run 11:29-11:59 pace but even at that, my heart rate would average around 155. To keep my HR 126-146, I'd have to "run" about 13:00 pace. They're never consistent for me.
My goal is to get my 305 heart rate monitor out of the box & use it when things calm down in a few weeks for us. Sad that I've had a garmin since 2007 & never used the heart rate monitors.
Add some hills, you'll slow down. ;-)
I call mine the Garmin Overlord. It beeps ruthlessly when I am doing it wrong, which is apparently most of the time. I have a cadence meter and a power tap on the "to buy" list and dread the day I have to figure those out! Good luck and great post!
OK funny that you mentioned this because I just got my garmin hear rate monitor out for the first time. And I can't believe how slow I have to go to keep a lower heart rate. Still lots of playing around to figure out what exactly my zones are (I'm still gathering lots of data)....but I'm hoping to utilize it one day!
I love numbers. But this slow thing screws me up. If I start off slow ... I never can speed up.
I need to stop fully, and wait for the cyborg computer to reset before I can choose another pace.
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