10 dull miles of General Aerobic, plus an experiment

Thursday's run: 10 miles of General Aerobic at 8:46 pace, controlled for data.

Thursday morning, I took the same route as in last Thursday's run, with only a few new observations about these blocks in the Mission:

• The day-laborers, instead of congregating on Cesar Chavez, now congregate one block north.
• I took note of the Theater Artaud, where I had seen a performance/reading from Daniel Handler's Adverbs.
• Next door is the Traveling Jewish Theater with a sign so permanent, I spent a few blocks wondering how traveling it was.

What had me more distracted was the experiment, or data collection, that Mike had me do in order to help understand what heart rate ranges I should be in on my various runs. (Read this post and this post if you need background on heart rate monitoring). The protocol was this:

• 1 mile warm-up
• 3 miles with a target heart rate of 145 bpm
• 3 miles with a target at 155 bpm
• 3 miles with a target at 165 bpm

The trouble with me seeking to run near an average heart rate is that I can't do it very well. It's like having a car with an outrageously sensitive accelerator, so you accelerate and brake, accelerate and brake, all in an attempt to keep a consistent speed. Instead, you accelerate and overshoot, break and overshoot, and keep going back and forth until you hit the middle. Then a hill comes along and the same thing happens.

I did use fairly narrow limits on the heart rate monitor so my heart rate didn't go too far from the target. At 145, I was barely putting one foot in front of the other at times to keep the heart rate low. At 155, I was moving faster, but still had to slow down quite a few times to keep the heart rate in range. After those two segments, with seven miles logged already, I was astonished at how fresh I felt. At 165, I was feeling like I was actually running, but still topping out above 168 a few times.

The results were modeled by Mike:

(Click to enlarge)

Qualitatively, this doesn't feel right. The point where the two lines cross is the deflection point that Mike discussed in his comments a few days ago. That deflection point suggests that at 158 bpm, I'm in Lactate Threshold Land.

This suggests that 90% of the running I did before I started with the heart rate monitor was in the LT category, or even faster. It also suggests that my goal pace should be slower than I currently think it is, which is counter-intuitive with the other methods that could be used to estimate the proper goal pace.

So I plan to keep at it, trying to figure this out with more data points and other techniques. My deciding to do a marathon is insane enough, and trying to do it via these advanced techniques, worrying about heart rate, is driving me crazier than I already am. Or not.