Thursday, November 12, 2009

Thursday 17 miles

17 miles, down from the altitude. Average pace 6:46/ avg HR 151 which is bull shit. It took the Garmin over a mile before it 'settled' down and it read 180+ for close to 10:00. Then midway I decided to take it off and run by feel... with the strap around my ass it read 200-220. So, my Garmin can quite accurately receive a signal from SPACE... but not from my chest strap which is 6" away? But at least I know my Ass Rate or "AR" in the scientific community. I would say for sure average HR was closer to 145. I capped it at 150 on the way out then let it slip to 155 on the way back. This felt nice and relaxed which is good.
I had hoped to get a sense of goal pace for next weekend's 50 mile race... I am pinpointing it somewhere between 7:00 and 8:30 pace. So, no clue. One online calculator says I can run 6:47 pace for 50 miles, doubt I'll be trying that.



13 comments:

Brett said...

Well thats the entire point of going by AssRate. What AssRate do you think you can maintain for 50 miles?

In all seriousness, I have seen an ultra pace estimator before out there somewhere. Its a different formula than the traditional mcmillan calculators...I can't find it now though, maybe you can try google.

I did try THIS ONE...I estimated a trail marathon (26.2m) pace of 2h55m, then had it predict 50m and it spit out 6h32m. It claims to be more accurate up through ultra distance events.

Don't know if thats an accurate trail marathon estimate for you right now or not...probably varies 10 different ways.

I did a search for "AssRate" and there is actually a person named Gabey Assrate in Reston Virginia. Poor her.

Lucho said...

Ha! Hilarious. I would say that after today my AR is somewhere in the 180 range. I'll get to the lab though and have it tested for real. Gabey wrote the book on the testing protocol.
Cool on the link. I would guess I could run under 2:50 for a trail marathon right now, 2:35ish for a road marathon? That all seems pretty vague though. It would depend on the trail.
Thanks Brett.

GZ said...

I strongly suggest that you engage in a long period of fixed ass rate training, where your ass learns to utilize fat as fuel.

Hey ... I know you have heard this before but ... Sportstracks. The Garmin will go wacky sometimes with the HR monitor - typically because of static electricity (less likely to occur once you have a good sweat going).

But you can split the run up in Sporttracks in a variety of ways so that you can see the AHR for the period where stuff was normal.

Of course, you could tell me to go shove it up my ass, but that is not in my FAR plan right now.

Lucho said...

Definitely! I do plan on several months of GZ (gluteus zone) training :) I just made that up.
I have been close several times to retrying the Sporttracks. I suppose I oughta get around to it. Your graph from the other day was tough to read.

GZ said...

Can't suggest GZ training. That guy is full of shit.

The charts can be much more simple than I have made them. I impose many lines on the same chart (often HR, pace and elevation) ... which can be tough to read but it makes sense to me (particularly since they often parallel each other).

Yesterday's graph had elevation (feet) and percent grade on the same line.

But again, they can be as simple as you want them.

Brandon Fuller said...

I once had Garmin tell me my HR was higher than my theoretical max. I took the strap off and laid it in the grass. It kept pumping away at that same HR. Fucking aliens -- I tell you.

Anonymous said...

Tim,

I've noticed that problem with my Garmin as well, and it really annoys me. It seems to happen when I just start running without a slow warmup, I'm wondering if that is what you did? Something about not syncing with your HR and getting confused.

Eric

GetBackJoJo said...

That's so funny about the Ass Rate.
My Garmin hr monitor does that too at times and I have never been able to figure out why. What I usually do when it happens is to let it go bananas, and then when it finally comes down to normal after 10 minutes or so, I click the lap button and then only count the hr for the second lap.

GZ said...

Most the time the HR monitor is freaked because of static electricity (between, your clothes, the montitor) ... which is why it is less likely to happen when you are warmed up (because you are wet, sweating).

Lucho said...

GZ has it right in regards to the HRM errors at the start. It has to do with sweat and conductivity.
Brandon- I took my chest strap off too and was running with it in my hand and it wouldn't die.

Matt said...

Re: HRM, it sounds like more trouble than it's worth! Wet the damn thing, spit on it before you go.

Sportstracks is definitely cool as is the Garmin Connect site. All free. I like the discrepancy (sarcasm) in altitude change (ft of climbing) between the three. Garmin's Training Center will say I climbed 900ft., Sportstracks (for the same run) ~700ft., and Garmin Connect ~550. Hilarious.

Therefore, Training Center works remarkably as a Sports psychologist, as well.

scott said...

When I first got my hr monitor I had the wild readings during first 5 mins. But now prior to putting it on I run the entire thing under water for about 3 seconds...I've never had the problem again and having the wet elastic part helps prevent slipping. When I have to travel somewhere and there isn't running water I just squirt water from my water bottle on it prior to putting it on. Works every time.

Just curious, what is your max hr?

Lucho said...

Scott- The only max HR's I am sure of is that I once held 195-198 for several minutes on a bike. I don't ever run hard so I don't my run max. I base everything on lactate threshold HR which changes with fitness. Max HR is a static number that doesn't have any relevance to current fitness levels. If you start your base training out of shape and are running at 70% of max, that is one level of intensity. But once you get super fit, and are still using 70% of max HR, that's a whole nother level of intensity. Using max HR to determine training intensities is useless in my opinion.