Beating Heart
Have you heard of HEART RATE training? Think listening to your body and its beating rhythm. Beyond speed and pace…. it’s connecting to the flow of your blood and effort. Being in the ZONE means you are working “just enough” in the run to get stronger with good-just-outside-your-comfort-zone training. Coz let’s be honest…. your true comfort zone would be on the couch watching tv.
It is the TURTLE-wins-the-race approach…long and slow. The speedy-hare practices flight-or-fight being chased by a cheetah… awesome for short distances where your body hits survival mode and hormones like cortisol and adrenaline give your quick-sprint-super-powers. Unfortunately, after the fight, wonder-woman needs extra rest and recovery to balance out the body for her next adventure.
As an ultra-runner, I have practiced long and slow TIME ON MY FEET in my training for both my fifty and hundred miler training plans. I am actually way better at taking it “easy” day after day in my training…and to be honest…I think most runners especially newbies would benefit from TIME ON FEET AND HEART RATE TRAINING verse hating the run coz it’s sooo hard all the time.
The crash after a very hard workout demands next-day recovery. It’s also worth noting that speed tends to make you push harder to hit the pace…. and often runners start ignoring the niggles and hot spots… PACE POLICE running means you push through it just to check off your target pace regardless of how you feel. When you spend too much time in the flight-or-fight mode… you will be more stressed, possibly overtrain, and burn out. Adrenal fatigue is a real thing that can happen to athletes pushing too hard all of the time.
HOW
I chose the MAF 180 FORMULA… which finds the ideal maximum aerobic heart rate to base all aerobic training.
How to find your HEART RATE ZONE: Subtract 180 minus your age…(then modify categories.. go here for MAF test) See all the details on the website he walks you through how to calculate your ZONE.
WHAT YOU NEED
A Garmin and Heart rate monitor.
Or if you are just started out, you can listen to your breathe sans the digital analysis (lol) old-school-shoes on and out the door training.
zone 1: resting heart rate… waking up and rested and sitting on the couch
zone 2: warm-up, comfortable, just-starting and smiling that you actually took the hardest step: the one out the front door.
zone 3: comfortably hard effort… you can kinda hold a conversation with your sole-sista…THIS is where you want to be for your training. Sole therapy conversations back and forth with reflection and breathing.
zone 4: beyond your comfort zone…short, broken sentences, and you kinda start wondering when it’s going to end..lol.
zone 5: being chased by the cheetah…. can only speak a few words at a time… hmmm this is where I feel like I am starting to gasp for air.
TIPS when you start heart rate training:
In the beginning, it is better to run out and back…sorry… you may find this boring but it really helps with heart rate training coz you use this as a tool to see if you are getting better…. TRAIN BY TIME… start with 60 minutes…. out for 30 min, then run home. Once you see your average distance in 60 min you can do loops.
Remember WEATHER, SLEEP, FOOD, RECOVERY will affect your heart rate. THIS is the ultimate lesson…. adjusting your runs to FIT INTO YOUR LIFE… so it’s PLAY not just MORE and MORE WORK to your body. If you are stressed, if you are not sleeping well if you are eating like crap… your runs will suffer and you will use it as a tool to adjust or vice versa. If the weather six (hello Florida summers) you slow down…. to adjust your pace… with the SAME EFFORT.