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Back In The Saddle- Getting Ready For Bloomsday

I came home to the mild Seattle weather, actually perfect running conditions. I can’t complain. I am suffering from jet-lag, or motivation to run. I’m not sure. I struggled to get out the door to run this morning.

Bloomsday is just around the corner and I am just not in my best shape. It’s frustrating running 9 minute miles, when I used to run sub-8 for middle distance. It’s not fun coming back from an injury.

I used my heart rate monitor as a guide today. I participated in a workshop from Heartzones, which is a company founded by Sally Edwards, the spokesperson for Danskin. Sally, has a testing protocol for predicting max heart rate, that is more accurate than 220 – your age (Karvonen Formula). My running max is somewhere between 195 – 200 beats per minute. I find that I am usually hitting 175 as a high, and around 158 average heart rate. Running at 175 puts me into zone 4, which is a little too anaerobic for a long run.

My goal for this run was to go for around an hour and to keep my heart rate under 160. I was somewhat successful. I ran for almost 66 minutes over a fairly hilly course. My average heart rate was 149. My high was 163. The last 10 minutes were difficult. My lungs were fine, but my feet were feeling the pounding.

I came home, stretched and iced. I plan on doing some cycling tomorrow to keep up my cardio and give my joints a break. I have 3 more weeks of training and then a small taper for Bloomsday, which is May 6th.