Platypus' Beginners Guide to Running

[Martynt74]

Haha is manually pressing buttons too tricky?

I loathe indoor cardio (rowing possibly exempt), i went on our cross trainer the other week and was bored rigid after 10 minutes and found myself looking at the time constantly. I was even watching Netflix at the same time and it didn't help.

Still getting in my head about my HR. Was running really well on Saturday and was going up a hill, thinking i usually stop at X to walk. I'll push myself to Y, then hit Y and felt capable of carrying on. Got near the top of the hill and thought i'd really go for it, so increased the pace quite a bit up the steepest part for about 60 seconds. My HR got up to 185 (it was around 178 at a more relaxed pace on the hills)

Looking at the resulting graph, it looks like i've barely changed intensity, but from about 3.2m to 3.3m i was ll out!

I don't get how i can run along at a moderate pace feeling pretty good at 175 for about half an hour, yet my push it to exhaustion only increased this by 10bpm!

On the downside this then seemed to wipe me out for the remaining 3 miles!

 

[div0]

To me the first week looks great. Most importantly you are enjoying the running and it feels easy. If it were me I'd keep that volume for a few weeks and adjust it upwards towards your target weekly goal gradually. Only then would I introduce the intervals. Increasing volume and tough sessions at the same is a good way of getting an injury. In answer to your question of what the 20% looks like, its answered in the book but basically no - don't make 20% of each run hard. Most of your runs should be easy throughout. When ready, make one of your weekly runs a dedicated interval session and make sure to follow it up with a couple of days of easy running again.

I wouldn't say I've set a particular weekly target yet, but given what you've said it seems sensible to just focus on repeating the sort of volume I'm currently doing and just gradually increasing each week until I've hopefully then finished reading the book! It turns out that I'm a natural 'slow' runner reader

 

[Ian_Eb]

It wasn't about the buttons, but I was thinking of persuading the device to adjust speed according to a target HR

 

[div0]

8am I was 15st 3.2lbs... did a Parkrun and went the gym... 11am I was 14st 13.1lbs!

(Parkrun was just my second run, but beat my previous best outdoor 5k by almost a minute. Ave HR was 169, which is very high for me though, so I guess I was pushing close to the limit)

Congrats, knocking a minute off your previous best is no mean feat. Not sure you'd catch me at the gym 2 hours after setting a new PB - impressive effort!

 

[div0]

Back up to 10km now

Sunday was grim, raining, cold, windy. Bizarrely however, I managed to choose the 1.5 Hr slot where everything calmed down and I didn't get blown over and rained on

Was your knee you were having trouble with wasn't it? I take it the 10km went ok? I've been enjoying playing weather roulette too - usually I've been waiting for a torrential downpour to stop and then gamble on getting a half decent weather window. Has mostly paid off, so fully expect to go out and get soaked tonight, now I've said that

Got up Saturday ready for a steady 10k and a park run... opened the curtains made coffee and played COD for an hr before hitting the treadmill. It really is treadmill weather.

Still i love Monday`s rest day

Haha, at least that way you don't have to deal with having to run into a 20mph head wind for half your run. The winds as I came down off the top of one of my local summits recently were so strong I struggled to run in a straight line and that's not even 200m above sea level. At least this week is starting to look a bit better.

 

[div0]

Still getting in my head about my HR. Was running really well on Saturday and was going up a hill, thinking i usually stop at X to walk. I'll push myself to Y, then hit Y and felt capable of carrying on. Got near the top of the hill and thought i'd really go for it, so increased the pace quite a bit up the steepest part for about 60 seconds. My HR got up to 185 (it was around 178 at a more relaxed pace on the hills)

Looking at the resulting graph, it looks like i've barely changed intensity, but from about 3.2m to 3.3m i was ll out!

I don't get how i can run along at a moderate pace feeling pretty good at 175 for about half an hour, yet my push it to exhaustion only increased this by 10bpm!

What are you using to measure HR? I see very similar behaviour with my watch (optical HR monitor) and someone above pointed out that they're just not very accurate.

From what you've said it sounds like your initial pace was probably good. I used to have a few hill runs where I'd usually stop at various places on the ascent too and since slowing down I now don't feel the need to stop at all either.

 

[Martynt74]

What are you using to measure HR? I see very similar behaviour with my watch (optical HR monitor) and someone above pointed out that they're just not very accurate.

From what you've said it sounds like your initial pace was probably good. I used to have a few hill runs where I'd usually stop at various places on the ascent too and since slowing down I now don't feel the need to stop at all either.

Yeah, just an optical HR device. It seems to be consistent over a few devices so i've always assumed as a base it's fairly accurate and just the timing of variations where it falls down.

Might order the strap and see how similar it is.

 

[SPG]

Thats your problem optical sensor, really only good when your not sweating and only doing light activity. Chest straps are not expensive and try and find one that is both BT and Ant+

 

[iMacMart]

I was outside in Baldock at the time of the run and some of the rain was epic - hats off to you, that's a great time for those conditions! I could barely see it was so heavy at one point!!

Went to the white lion after for a few pints, the black stuff went down a treat

Cheers

 

[Martynt74]

Thats your problem optical sensor, really only good when your not sweating and only doing light activity. Chest straps are not expensive and try and find one that is both BT and Ant+

Yeah, have ordered the Garmin Tri one. I have no intention of swimming in it, but a few websites suggested it was more resilient and i do sweat a lot!

 

[AndyCr15]

Congrats, knocking a minute off your previous best is no mean feat. Not sure you'd catch me at the gym 2 hours after setting a new PB - impressive effort!

Thanks. Gym was not 2 hours later... it was a stop on the cycle home from the Parkrun (Tbf, 2 hours later would probably be harder!) I figured I do a 5k on the treadmill most times I'm at the gym. Not all that different

 

[D.P.]

Haha is manually pressing buttons too tricky?

I loathe indoor cardio (rowing possibly exempt), i went on our cross trainer the other week and was bored rigid after 10 minutes and found myself looking at the time constantly. I was even watching Netflix at the same time and it didn't help.

Still getting in my head about my HR. Was running really well on Saturday and was going up a hill, thinking i usually stop at X to walk. I'll push myself to Y, then hit Y and felt capable of carrying on. Got near the top of the hill and thought i'd really go for it, so increased the pace quite a bit up the steepest part for about 60 seconds. My HR got up to 185 (it was around 178 at a more relaxed pace on the hills)

Looking at the resulting graph, it looks like i've barely changed intensity, but from about 3.2m to 3.3m i was ll out!

I don't get how i can run along at a moderate pace feeling pretty good at 175 for about half an hour, yet my push it to exhaustion only increased this by 10bpm!

On the downside this then seemed to wipe me out for the remaining 3 miles!

I would first question whether your 175 "relaxed" pace was a realistic number or if it was actually relaxed. For almost everyone, 175 would be hell of an effort. Even for less trained people that have a naturally high max HR 175 is very high. What are you using to measure your HR? It sound like you might be using a wrist-base optical HR from your running watch, which is simply picking up your cadence. Coincidentally, average running cadence in most people is about 170-185.

Is this 175 value something you see on all your runs at the same effort level?

The other thing that effort level does increase exponentially with HR. At the top end, 10BPM is quite a big change in effort. It sometimes make more sense to look at the percentage relative to your easy running rate. For me, on the flat ground with fresh legs going at a very easy pace I will be at about 137-140bpm, that is more like 147-150 to get general aerobic run with some gentle/short hills where most of my running occurs. 177-182 is me all out during an 800m interval. Pushing myself to limits where I think I might black out I am at 185-188 (last few hundred m of a 10k/HM chasing something to a podium finish). If I subtract 137 as my lowest running kind of a pathetic jog pace, then my regular run pace HR is 147-137 = 10, and my hard workout effort is 177-137 =40, 'm going to die is 187-137=50. At this normalized scale, my hard weekly workouts will see me peak at 4X the HR intensity of my regular runs. My 800m repeats do feel somethign akin to 4x harder to a regular running pace.

 

[D.P.]

Ok, so first 'slow' run complete.

Thoughts:

- Felt like I ran at a pace where I could easily have held a conversation without any difficulty.
- Finished without feeling at all out of breath, and without feeling like my heart rate really went up much at all.
- Ran for 10km in what would roughly be my previous marathon pace (5:17km).
- Felt like I could easily have done same distance again if I wanted to push on, but stopped at 10km.

From what I've read, my max heart rate should be about 181, which would make zone 2 (70-80%) anything between 127 and 144?

According to my watch my average HR was 147, so still too high, despite feeling like my pacing was really slow.

Currently not able to drop any money on a proper HR monitor, so either have byto go the watch or do things the old fashioned way for the time being.

What do people think of the above? Try same again tomorrow, see how I feel? Try slowing down further?


-

How is your current fitness compared to when you previously ran the marathon at 5:17km.

An actual easy pace will be about 1:30 to 2:00 minutes per mile, so in metric you should be looking to run at about 6:00km if you have the same fitness. If you are less fit then that might be more like 6:30km pace.


The other thing is it is hard to measure your Max HR. The whole 220-age is very ball park. To really know your max you need a test on a TM that increases opace and angle every few minutes until you basically pass out. The best approximation is to find out what max HR you hit at the tail end of a hard race like a 10km where you thought you would die if you didn't stop yet you pushed on another 1 minute to get your PR.

 

[Martynt74]

I would first question whether your 175 "relaxed" pace was a realistic number or if it was actually relaxed. For almost everyone, 175 would be hell of an effort. Even for less trained people that have a naturally high max HR 175 is very high. What are you using to measure your HR? It sound like you might be using a wrist-base optical HR from your running watch, which is simply picking up your cadence. Coincidentally, average running cadence in most people is about 170-185.

Is this 175 value something you see on all your runs at the same effort level?

The other thing that effort level does increase exponentially with HR. At the top end, 10BPM is quite a big change in effort. It sometimes make more sense to look at the percentage relative to your easy running rate. For me, on the flat ground with fresh legs going at a very easy pace I will be at about 137-140bpm, that is more like 147-150 to get general aerobic run with some gentle/short hills where most of my running occurs. 177-182 is me all out during an 800m interval. Pushing myself to limits where I think I might black out I am at 185-188 (last few hundred m of a 10k/HM chasing something to a podium finish). If I subtract 137 as my lowest running kind of a pathetic jog pace, then my regular run pace HR is 147-137 = 10, and my hard workout effort is 177-137 =40, 'm going to die is 187-137=50. At this normalized scale, my hard weekly workouts will see me peak at 4X the HR intensity of my regular runs. My 800m repeats do feel somethign akin to 4x harder to a regular running pace.

Cheers @D.P.

The 175 wasn't particularly relaxed as i was going up a slight hill but it certainly didn't feel like too much of an effort. My regular run is around 35 minutes and shows a HR average of 165 on a run that's 90% flat at a pace i could realistically keep up for 2 hours.

Yeah, using the Garmin watch for the reading. I was always of the mindset that the readings were airly accurate (within a few bpm) and that the only element it wasn't great at was picking up sudden changes in HR.

I've since bought the Garmin HRM so will see how that compares. Was going to go this morning, but my throat is killing from spending the last few days ripping out a bathroom and scraping off old tile adhesive which has resulted in breathing in a crap load of dust!

 

[Ian_Eb]

I found that if you have the watch fairly well attached to your wrist it is a close match to the strap (So far) if it is even slightly loose then the readings move away quite rapidly. For a 5 km just after the kids have gone to bed, I just use the watch. For everything else I use the strap.

With the strap it is better. As log as you watch for things like the contact pads being too dry, or the battery flaking out etc. I sometimes get a thing where my HR hits around 199 within the first 100 yards. If it does this then the pads are too dry. Battery issues normally give really odd values.

 

[SPG]

If you are using a Garmin watch it will alert you for low battery warning. But as Ian says wet the contacts before wearing it a good nice long lick does the trip if you keep it clean

The biggest problem i have is the indication if its connected its not really that clear.

 

[div0]

How is your current fitness compared to when you previously ran the marathon at 5:17km.

Hard to say, as I've certainly not done as much longer distance (15+ miles) since I started getting back into running. In general though I'm still pretty fit and would certainly expect I could run 20km at that sort of pace reasonably easily.

An actual easy pace will be about 1:30 to 2:00 minutes per mile

I'm struggling to work out what you meant to say here, but I'm pretty sure a 2 minute mile is never going to be easy

so in metric you should be looking to run at about 6:00km if you have the same fitness. If you are less fit then that might be more like 6:30km pace.

I posted some other updates further up and did slow down further on several of my subsequent runs last week. Was closer to 5:35/km. I'll try to slow down further still on my next run.

The other thing is it is hard to measure your Max HR. The whole 220-age is very ball park. To really know your max you need a test on a TM that increases opace and angle every few minutes until you basically pass out. The best approximation is to find out what max HR you hit at the tail end of a hard race like a 10km where you thought you would die if you didn't stop yet you pushed on another 1 minute to get your PR.

How important is it to accurately know your max HR at the stage I'm currently at? Pushing myself to the point of feeling like death isn't at the top of my todo list currently.

Thanks for all the imput, much appreciated.

 

[SPG]

The normal formula of 220 - your age is good enough for us mortals when starting out tbh.

 

[Martynt74]

Yeah, i find that fairly accurate for me. When pushing myself to the limit i tend to be around 189, and that calculation gives me 187.

Went out last night with the Garmin HRM for the first time and feel better about my impending death from heart failure!

I know obviously it could depend on various factors but i followed the same "easy" route as i did last week and the average HR was 147. Still probably a little higher than expected but given my height/weight it's properly more where i'd expect it to be vs 165bpm previously reported.

It spikes where i'd expect it to (hill), then drops down nicely as i potter along fairly comfortably and then increases towards the end as i built up the pace for the last stretch.

One thing i did find was how much more comfortable i felt in that end stretch running faster. I was probably around 7:45min/miles for about 0.4miles and whilst it was tiring i definitely felt like i could've continued a bit longer. In the past, any increased pace like that would wipe me out really quickly. I'll put that down to the weight loss which helps motivation to continue.

What's also quite funny is that it feels like i've barely ran this month and am at 58miles for the month which would've been a "typical" month for me last year, yet this month i feel like i've hardly been out and been resting a lot trying to get over this stupid foot issue.

 

[D.P.]

Hard to say, as I've certainly not done as much longer distance (15+ miles) since I started getting back into running. In general though I'm still pretty fit and would certainly expect I could run 20km at that sort of pace reasonably easily.



I'm struggling to work out what you meant to say here, but I'm pretty sure a 2 minute mile is never going to be easy



I posted some other updates further up and did slow down further on several of my subsequent runs last week. Was closer to 5:35/km. I'll try to slow down further still on my next run.



How important is it to accurately know your max HR at the stage I'm currently at? Pushing myself to the point of feeling like death isn't at the top of my todo list currently.

Thanks for all the imput, much appreciated.

I missed out some words there!

But basically your easy training pace will be about 1.5-2minutes slower per mile than your marathon pace.
Converting that to metric, that is a bout 6min/km pace. It seems you are going to be a little less fit (as in pure run performance) than when you did your marathon so easy pace might be more like 6:20/km.

That might feel very slow but as you build up volume and reduce recovery time, start adding long runs or workouts then that easy pacestarts to feel much harder and it is a relief to be able to run that slow.


As a ball park, 220-age is accurate but there is high variance. So a 30yo on average will be at 190, but could easily be at 210 or 170 etc. You don't need to be too accurate now, bu if you expect your Max HR to be 190 then next time you end up running really hard and feel you can;t run much faster have a look aferwards what your HR really was. Once you start interval training you get a better idea