Wednesday, June 11, 2008

heart rates and other things

In my previous posting I stated I thought my average marathon HR should be 160. Steve's comment made me do a little more investigating and I went back to a website (runningtools.com) calculator I found months ago. You can enter your AT or max HR and it gives you HR averages for different race distances. I entered in 167 for my AT and 182 for my max and it gave me marathon HRs of 155 and 154, respectively.

This morning my regular running partners and I went out for a 9.3 mile run. Another one of our friends joined us for the first three miles. He pulled us along a little faster than we really wanted to go but I didn't say anything because his shirt had the phrase: Shut up and run. :-) After 3 miles he left us and we just kept the pace going. We finished the 9.3 in 1:09:12 or a 7:26 average pace. A new loop record for us. I'm not very 'pace aware' so I was thinking that this run better be at 8:00 or better or I have no chance in my next marathon. I have lost some confidence in my ability since my Fargo experience. Well, we had great running weather this morning with temps in the mid-50s and cloudy skies. My average HR was 144 for the run so this was a great confidence booster today.

So now my plan for Afton is to try to run/walk with a HR in the mid/lower 150s. At this moment I think it will give me my best chance for success (finishing just as I run out of energy).

My plan for the rest of the week:
Thursday - run 6.2
Friday - run 12
Saturday - rest
Sunday - run a loop at Afton in the afternoon heat!

--Mark

2 comments:

keith said...

Mark! I think it's normal to question your abilities after a trying experience, but you've got to trust that you learn more from the rough times than the good times. If anything, Fargo will have, in the long run made you a stronger runner!

Keep up the good work!

SteveQ said...

I may see you at Afton - and I'll have a heart monitor on!