I haven’t run for four days. I don’t like not running for that length of time, it does weird things to my mind not least messing with my confidence.
I needed a rest though. Depending on what I do at club on Monday night April could well become my biggest month in terms of miles since I started running three years ago, and that includes when I was marathon training.
But I wasn’t really motivated to do anything this evening, yet I knew I needed to. Taking five days off would really wreak havoc with my belief in my ability so, as is often the case at times like this, I thought if I was going to go out then I’d use the run to try something new or to continue experimenting with something running related.
In tonight’s case that meant another go at running within a specific heart rate zone, namely Zone 3 for which the bpm range falls between 123-139.
Not really wanting to go out for too long I thought I’d give it half-an-hour to see how it went.
The idea is to run at a pace which keeps your heart rate within certain boundaries and, through time, it’s supposed to help you get faster within that range, which then has a positive impact on your speed/stamina when you go up a zone and so on. Or something like that.
All I know is that tonight I found it tough. Not in terms of running – that was fine – but it was tough on my legs. It actually felt like they were having to work harder just to stay within the zone with the effect that they began to hurt, with the pain only beginning to ease when I increased my speed which, of course, I couldn’t really do.
It felt really slow. Like I was going nowhere, or wading through treacle.
As I said a few moments ago I had to aim for somewhere between 123-139 bpm … I thought I had managed it because I got very few alerts on my watch to say I’d gone over, but looking back at my stats it seems I averaged 141 which maybe isn’t too bad.
Clearly it’s not something I’ll get right first time, it’s something to work on. I’ve only really dabbled so far, but if I give it a chance and some proper time then hopefully it’ll benefit me.
For now, though, it served the purpose of getting me out the door which is no bad thing.
HUFF, PUFF AND SHUFFLE 