I am a numbers girl when it comes to exercise.
Not because I’m a professional athlete or anything; I’m just curious about them.
When I went running in high school and college, I HAD to wear my HRM, and I HAD to wear my watch/measure my GPS distance. After all, if you don’t measure it, does it even count? While checking your heart rate to and distances are fine, I became a bit obsessed with the nitty gritty of it. Was I fast enough? Was I pushing myself far enough each day? What’s my calorie burn? How do I compare to every other random cyber-stranger on Garmin?
As you can imagine, that level of self-criticism gets ugly fast.
Now, keeping in mind I have never been hugely quick, nor hugely skilled with endurance running, I pretty much just used these numbers to drive myself mental and beat myself up a bit; neither of which was particularly helpful for my running, and possibly a contributor to why I stopped for several years.
BUT, I have found my solution, and possibly my salvation.
After a 5 day break, I went for my first run this morning with the intention of just enjoying it. I have been reading Finding Ultra (Rich Roll) and Born to Run (Christopher McDougall) over my short holiday, and was completely enamoured by the idea of running for the sake of it. For the love of it.
So, strapping on my trusty Nikes and Garmin, I took off; immediately switching the screens on my watch so that instead of showing my pace or distance, the watch displayed my heart rate/zone.
By focusing on keeping my heart rate in Zone 3 (and around 150bpm), I was able to run without stopping, without any extremely laboured breathing, and maintain a steady (if somewhat slow) pace throughout.
And even better; I smiled and enjoyed it the entire time.
More often than not, when I run (attempting to push a pace or distance) I have brief moments of hating life. Maybe you have these too. When you’re standing on the roadside with your hands braced against your knees, winded af, it can be a little demoralising for even the most cheerful of chaps. With today’s adventure, there was none of that. Just joy. And I ultimately ended up going farther than I had anticipated; almost double my planned distance!
The science behind Zone training is pretty well understood, but in case you are still learning (like me) here is a little breakdown for you;
Most websites describe either four or five zones. As my watch suggests there are five, this is what my writing is based on.
- Zone 1: <70%
- Zone 2: 65-75%
- Zone 3: 75-85%
- Zone 4: 85-95%
- Zone 5: 90-100%
These percentages are calculated based off your Maximum Heart Rate (MHR). A simple (though not exact) way to calculate your theoretical MHR is to take 220 and subtract your age. The resulting number is your theoretical MHR, however this calculation does not take into account an individual’s personal fitness levels, which may otherwise affect their resting heart rate (RHR).
While each zone has its benefits and purposes, as someone looking to improve my endurance, zone 2 is the way to go.
Touted as the ultimate zone for improving base fitness, its been reported by some specialists that zone 2 training makes up 60-75% of total training time for professional endurance athletes; be they swimmers, cyclists or triathletes. (1)
While I am not completely adverse to sprints or hill climbs, I wouldn’t be lying if I said they were far from my favourite part of running. The part that I enjoy most is the LSD – the Long Slow Distance. Being able to switch off while running (or swimming, cycling, etc) and just let my mind wander, is absolutely heaven for me, and part of the big reason why I enjoy running; it’s my meditation of choice.
So today’s run was almost 100% around 150bpm the entire time, that technically puts me in Zone 3. Interestingly enough, I felt extremely positive about the entire run, until I looked at my pace: 7:28/km; remarkably non-quick. My initial crestfallen feeling as a result of seeing this number further cemented in my mind that in order to continue my love of running, it may be necessary to turn off the competitor-mode. To stop checking out how fast I rate compared to others, and to instead just look inward, and to (as corny as it sounds) listen to my heart.
(Okay, I intended for the corniness. #Sorrynotsory)
To run in Zone 2 might drive me nuts, but if it’ll improve my overall endurance, it’s a plod I’m willing to take.
If you’re at the end of your rope and feeling a bit down about the competitive nature of running (EVEN when its just for recreational Park Run on Sundays, and EVEN when you’re only comparing yourself to other people on Strava/Garmin/FitBit etc); perhaps consider flipping your thinking, and changing your outlook, to an INlook (har har).
But seriously. Try it. It may just be the refresher you need, that also helps you kick butt in future running endeavours.
If you liked this article, consider checking out this one on fitness tracking, or my intro to training for a half marathon.
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