Garmin Watch vs Android HandyRunner Entry

I had a little experiment to see how accurate the HandyRunner capturing the running information on my Samsung Android Phone.

From the distant point of view, HandyRunner is capturing relatively accurate (see below).

Although the duration captured by HandyRunner is longer, it is because I pressed on the Start button earlier on HandyRunner before the run and  I Stop it slightly later.  Since I do not have a proper arm pouch for my phone I have to start the program first and then put the phone in my arm pouch before the run.  Thus, I would say that duration and pace captured by HandyRunner is pretty accurate.

As for the map captured (see below), both devices are giving me comparable data but the elevation information from HandyRunner is not that nice.

Lastly for the pace (see below), since there's no heart beat monitoring for HandyRunner, there will not be any data captured by HandyRunner.  As observed from the starting and ending pace captured by HandyRunner, that is due to fact that I insert my phone to the pouch before the run.  So, HandyRunner is "accurately" capturing that "slow" start and stop also.

Except for the elevation, I think HandyRunner can be used as replacement just in case I do not have the Garmin watch handy.  Moreover, playing music and having HandyRunner running for the whole run (~1 hour) only consume 4% of my phone battery.

Nice scenery

I like to run at this road very much mainly due to the mist in the morning.  And this morning, the whole road is just fantastic...

What a great way to spend my morning!

My Max Heart Rate

From the recent stress test in medical check up, I was asked to run until my max heart rate using.  Even when I reach my max heart rate, I feel that I can still proceed with the run and my heart rate continue to increase.  So, I started to find out more about the max heart rate calculation of 220-age.

After some search in the internet, I realized that the general formula is the average of all human being regardless of health condition and living habits.  According to an article, the true max heart rate for a healthy man is higher than what is calculated from the formula.

Further search suggested that we can find our own max heart rate.  That is very good.  I followed what is suggested in Runner's World article, Learn to Find Your Max Heart Rate, and come out with my own max heart rate.  It turns out to be 188 bpm, which I think is more accurate.  There's another formula in calculating max heart rate, ie. 205-(0.5*age).  Using the formula will give my max heart rate of 185 bpm, which is close to what I got myself.

So, I will use 188 bpm as max heart rate and 72 bpm as resting heart rate to formulate my training zone target.

Here's the training zone suggested in Runner's World.

Easy Run (recovery zone)
Pace: One to two minutes slower than marathon pace
% Max heart rate: 65 to 70% [148~154 bpm]
Perceived Effort: 3 to 4/easy
Talk Test: Complete conversation
Training Run (aerobic zone)
Pace: Marathon pace or slightly slower
% Max heart rate: 75 to 85% [159~171 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 heart rate: 88 to 92% [174~179 bpm]
Perceived Effort: 7 to 8/hard
Talk Test: A few words at a time
Intervals (VO2 max zone)
Pace: Mile to 5-K pace or faster
% Max heart rate: 95 to 100% [183~188 bpm]
Perceived Effort: 9/very hard
Talk Test: Can't...talk...must...run...

My First Half Marathon - APBIM 2012

As this is my first long run race, I was very excited.  I initially planned to sleep from 7pm to 11pm before leaving for the race.  However, I only managed to take 1 hour sleep from 7:30pm to around 8:30pm.  Filled my stomach with noodles and ~1.5 liters of water before leaving for the race.

I reached the race site at around 1:30am and had my car properly parked before the road closure.  Unfortunately, I started to feel hungry and sleepy at around 3am just before the race started.  I just ignore the feeling and focus on the run.

Getting ready to the starting line, I was stuck in almost the middle of the crowd together with my friends.

When the gun fired, everything went as expected and I was squeezing my way to the front of the crowd (of course I didn't succeed).  At around 1km after the starting line, the road became narrow and everyone was stuck there again.  I had to run on the side of the road to make my way up front as much as I can.

As I normally run for 10 km during my training, I was very relax for the 1st 10 km including a bit of climbing in the middle of the bridge.  I was at the pace of <6min/km for the 1st 10km except at area where I was stuck in the middle of the crowd.  I then stopped for the drink and walked about 1min before I continued to run again.

I started to feel a bit of tired at ~13 km (after 1.5 hours of running).  13~14 km is the longest continues run that I had during my training.  So, I guess that's the limit.  I had to push myself to move forward and checking my watch very often to know how many km left.

At 17 km point, I was really struggling.  My mind was asking me to stop running and just walk to finish the race.  On the other hand, I wanted to hit the 2:15 timing and I pushed myself to just keep on running... just 4 km to go... I told myself that I could do 4km during training with no sweat!  However, I really had to spend conscious effort to move every single step after the 17 km point.  Running for 1 km was a great effort and a long way to go.  The sign of "Pain Now...  Char Koey Teow Later.." tells me that a lot of people is struggling as well and I just had to keep on running to complete the race.

I was so excited when I saw the sign of just 1 km to go.  Although I heard that I had to keep my pace constant but I can't help myself from running faster.  I checked my Garmin watch to know that I was running at less than 5mins/km.  However, the fast run only last for around 300m (not the1 km fast run that I wished) and I had to slow down to around 6:40min/km pace.

I finally complete the race with 2:11 on my watch!  I was so excited and couldn't express my feeling at that moment.  I knew for sure that I will take another half marathon again some time.

Before I started my real training (~1 year ago), I set the target for myself to complete the race in 3 hour time.  After I started the real training (~8 months ago), I set up another target to complete the race in 2.5 hours.  A few weeks before the race, I think I am going to shoot for 2h15mins.

Well, I finally made it in 2:11:35 according to official time.

The tracking from Garmin Forerunner 210 is with the time of 2:11:49.

To me, this is very accurate tracking that I can certainly make use of the tool for future training.

To have a better half marathon run, I think I need to train for a longer run ~18 km so that I will not be struggling like what I experienced after the 17 km point.  Food and drink planning that I had for this run was not bad.

Overall, I am satisfy with the results despite having a bit of knees discomfort for 2 days after the run.