Data for geeks
The weather, as one would expect, has put a bit of a halt to our regular runs. We may be really into this running thing, but no sane person goes out with the wind chills we've been having lately. (The actual temp hit 8 below zero the other night, and wind chills were 20 below and more.)
Today, tegyrius suggested that we go out for a run before dinner, as it had "warmed up" to a balmy 32 degrees. I was not enthusiastic about this plan at all. We'd both finished a full day of work, and I was ready for dinner and comfy pants. But...it meant we can sleep in a bit later tomorrow, so I agreed.
I must confess, I spent some Christmas gift money on a fun new toy. I bought a Garmin Forerunner 310XT. It looks like a rather large and clunky watch. With it, I can track precisely how far I run and how fast. Hooray for data! And it has a heart rate monitor too. The first time I used the heart rate monitor, I found that the hills in the Arboretum pretty much push me into the red zone immediately. As in, my "max heart rate" for my age is supposed to be 181, and I was burying the needle pretty constantly on the uphills. It was not fun at all.
Tonight, I made an effort to keep the HR more reasonable - more in the 160's, per my dad's advice. And it was my best run in quite a while! I ran two miles, and felt like I could have gone more. I was SUPER slow, but that may be what I need right now. We seem to be maintaining our conditioning with a once-a-week-when-the-weather-cooperates run, and hopefully when it warms up and we can go back to three a week, we'll begin improving again.
Today, tegyrius suggested that we go out for a run before dinner, as it had "warmed up" to a balmy 32 degrees. I was not enthusiastic about this plan at all. We'd both finished a full day of work, and I was ready for dinner and comfy pants. But...it meant we can sleep in a bit later tomorrow, so I agreed.
I must confess, I spent some Christmas gift money on a fun new toy. I bought a Garmin Forerunner 310XT. It looks like a rather large and clunky watch. With it, I can track precisely how far I run and how fast. Hooray for data! And it has a heart rate monitor too. The first time I used the heart rate monitor, I found that the hills in the Arboretum pretty much push me into the red zone immediately. As in, my "max heart rate" for my age is supposed to be 181, and I was burying the needle pretty constantly on the uphills. It was not fun at all.
Tonight, I made an effort to keep the HR more reasonable - more in the 160's, per my dad's advice. And it was my best run in quite a while! I ran two miles, and felt like I could have gone more. I was SUPER slow, but that may be what I need right now. We seem to be maintaining our conditioning with a once-a-week-when-the-weather-cooperates run, and hopefully when it warms up and we can go back to three a week, we'll begin improving again.