My new (again) Heart Rate Training Zone

I have been having difficulty to determine my max heart rate.  Initially back in Dec 2012, I concluded that my max heard rate was 188 bpm.  Then, back in Jan 2015, I noticed my heart rate of 196bpm and thus determine that my max heart rate was 196 bpm.  However, starting 2016 and 2017, I started to read my heart rate of even more than 200 bpm, which I started to doubt the reading.

After talking to a colleague who has been running for more than 30 years, he told me that very likely my heart rate monitoring device is having issue.  I didn't immediately got a new heart rate monitoring belt until I misplaced it.  I then get myself a new heart rate monitoring belt.

With the new belt, I found out that my heart rate is more consistent now.  With the very high stress in the Station 4 running of Penang Round Island Relay with uphill, I found my heart rate of 186 bpm.  After checking the old post in 2012, where heart rate monitoring belt was new, to know that my max heart rate was determined as 188 bpm, I now think that my max heart rate of 186 bpm is more accurate now.

With that, the new training zones are with follows:-

Easy Run (recovery zone)
Pace: 1~2 mins slower than marathon pace
% Max hear rate: 65 to 78% [120~144 bpm]
Perceived Effort: 3 to 4/easy
Talk Test: Complete conversation
Training Run (aerobic zone)
Pace: Marathon pace or slightly slower
% Max hear rate: 80 to 89% [148~165 bpm]
Perceived Effort: 5 to 6/moderate
Talk Test: Full sentences

Tempo Run (threshold zone)
Pace: 20 to 30 seconds slower than 5-K pace
% Max hear rate: 88 to 92% [163~170 bpm]
Perceived Effort: 7 to 8/hard
Talk Test: A few words at a time
Intervals Run (VO2 max zone)
Pace: Mile to 5-K pace or faster
% Max hear rate: 95 to 100% [176~185 bpm]
Perceived Effort: 9/very hard
Talk Test: Can't... talk... must... run...

I will be focusing to increase my weekly mileage to be more than 40 km before working on speed, I will be mostly training at Easy pace with max heart rate of ~144 bpm.  Only with I managed to increase my weekly mileage to be more than 40 km or around that, I will pick a day to train for Training Run and Tempo Run.  Again, during that time, has to work harder on the core strength too!

Concluding 2017 (7th year of running - my 1st FM)

After 7 years of running I finally tried out a full marathon.  It is not a pleasant one that cause me to be very demotivating in running for a few months before I start to like training again.  I guess this could be over train syndrome.  I didn't force myself to hard to get back to my normal weekly mileage of 20km and my weekly mileage drop for a few weeks or months.  Another possibility could be the change in my life style since I didn't take up a full time job this year and still looking to get a balance in my life.
The above caused me to run my worse HM in Jul and Nov.
All of these could pass now as I started to get exited in training again and looking at logging 20km consistently again as soon as I could.
I concluded the year with another Penang Round Island Relay, which initially I wasn't intended to join.  I joined the relay for the pass 2 years and found that very tiring to start my journey as early as 3am and ended around 2pm in the afternoon.  For this year, I just participated in my run and went back home for rest before going to the finish line again when the team finished.  I was running in Station #4 with up hill that not much people like to run.  However, it turned out not too bad to me to be able to run 5:49min/km pace, which I am very satisfy with despite having high fever the week before with less than 10 km per week for the last 2 weeks.
As I was working hard to cut down my races, I finally managed to do it this year due to other commitment.  For the whole 2017, I just joined 5 races including my 1st FM.  There were 2 races that I wanted to join but not able to due to schedule conflict.


Summary for 2017:-

1. Joined my 1st FM.  Concluded that I need more training to participate in FM.
2. Clocking my my worst HM timing which could be due to insufficient training or age!
3. Participated in only 5 races, vs 13 races in 2016!

My plan for 2018:-

1. Increase weekly mileage.  Slowly increase my mileage to ~30km per week.
2. Increase my weekly running days to 4 days a week.
3. Join less races.  Only focus on HM locally, or charity race, hoefully 5~6 races should be good enough.

My First Full Marathon

After running for 5 years, I finally completed a Full Marathon in Perlis Marathon.  I signed up for Full Marathon after several "encouragement" from the running peers and thought I should had more time to train now after I didn't engage with a full time job for now.

However, my running mood was very down that I practically stop running except for weekend 10km run for the last few weeks before the FM...

Since this is my 1st FM, my aim is just to experience the long distant and complete the race before the cut-off time.  So, I started the run with "slow" pace of around 8min/km.  To avoid muscle cramp, which I heard often from other running friends, I took 100+ in every water stations.  Everything progress as plan.  When I reached 22km check marker, I was very happy because that was the longest distant that I had ever run.  I felt excited to start a new journey.  My goal after this point is just to run as far as I could and start my run-walk plan!

Very soon at 25km, I started to experience pain at the ball of my foot.  I carried on for awhile (a few tens of meters) and I just decided to walk.  From my calculation, if I started the walk at this point, I still would be able to complete before the cut-off time.  I just counting down the remaining distance for the completion...

A few kilometer later, the pain propagated to the heel of my foot even thou I was just walking.  Very soon, I started to feel the pain coming from my thigh muscles of my left leg.  I had to keep walking with fast pace (~10min/km) in order to finish the Full Marathon distant before the cut-off time.  Thus, I just keep the fast walking pace with pain as I believe the permanent injury due to fast walk is not high.  Later part of the walking, the pain propagate to side of my foot and then top of my foot.

At around 30 km of the race, I also felt strain in my abdomen muscles.  I tried to jog slowly, but my pain in my foot was very intense.  I thought to myself that I just have to walk to avoid further injury.

At 40 km, I was thinking to complete the race with 2km jog but then I was just couldn't, the pain at my foot was so intolerable.  Anyhow, I force myself to jog the last 500 m just to look nice at the finish line!

Luckily, with the help of energy gel, I didn't feel that so called "hit-the-wall" symptom.  But really feel like to give up especially the last few kilometers!

Beside completing my first full marathon, I also logged the longest weekly distance of all time at 48.8 km!

Overall, I am very happy with the run although I feel terrible.  I managed to know my weakness to work on for the next Full Marathon.  I think I would not join another Full Marathon without a proper preparation.

I need to work on the core and a longer distant run during training.

Feeling Down

For the month of Feb, I managed to log at least 30 km per week for 3 weeks (44 km in one of the weeks) and with ~23 km in the last week.  Again, I managed to repeat that in March with at least 30 km/week for 3 weeks (with 42 km max) and 25 km in the 4th week.  Unfortunately, April is really a pull back.  For the last 2 weeks, I really didn't feel like running and even suspecting myself of having heart problem.  I took a real rest for the next 3 weeks with only one run per week with ~10 km run.  Only after resting for 3 weeks, I started to check out the so-called heart problem to understand that the pain in my chest is not really related to heart.  After checking, it is likely that I had a strain in chest muscles.

Finally, I started to feel like running again... and looking forward for my first Full Marathon in the coming weekend.

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Extraction from Dr. Thomas Graboys articles.

Understanding Chest Pain
Characteristics	Cardiac Chest Pain	Other Chest Pain
Time of day when pain often occurs	Morning	End of the day
How it usually feels	Pressure, heaviness, constriction, burning, or squeezing. Feels “deep” rather than superficial. Often very hard to describe. Diffuse. May be in the chest. May also radiate to throat, jaw, or even arms and back. Can’t really be “pointed to”/	Feels like real pain, often sharp. Usually more local. May actually be at one point. Usually easy to point to location of pain.
What brings it on?	Pain is usually preceded by exertion, especially upper arm movements like carrying a briefcase, shoveling snow, or carrying bundles. Exertion during exposure to temperature extremes is common provocation. Sometimes follows a heavy meal, especially with exertion. May wake you from sleep.	Usually occurs “out of the blue”. “Heart burn” may come after eating, especially fried foods.
Duration of pain	Usually lasts as long as exertion, but rapidly declines when you stop or reduce exertion.	May come and go very quickly, fleeting, just a few seconds. Or it may last several hours
What relieves it	Stopping exertion. With angina (“aching” from the heart), lying down makes it worse. Sitting and “leaning into” the discomfort helps. SEEK MEDICAL ADVICE – TREATMENT IS MANDATORY!	Exertion or exercise may actually stop this pain. Also: Breathing exercises. Simple analgesics: aspirin, ibuprofen (e.g. Advil), or acetaminophen (e.g. Tylenol). Application of local heat (wet or dry). Antacids (e.g. Tums, Rolaids). Simple reassurance that pain is not from the heart can be very effective.