150 BPM

I have a new running program. Heart rate training! The theory is you’ve got five heart rate zones. Each zone is a range of beats per minute that target certain fitness goals. If you’d like to calculate your zones, go here. The zones are as follows:

1. Walking. For me that’s 133-146. I don’t have anything to say about this zone. It’s walking.

2. Fat burning aerobic. For me that’s 146-159 bpm. This zone is where your body burns fat and builds endurance. This is the zone in which I’m training. It’s a slow run early in training. I have to walk every so often to keep my heart rate down. But this zone also helps your heart become more efficient, so with time, you’ll be able to run faster with the same bpm. Right now, in order to stay under 150 bpm, my mile time averages 14:09 over 4 miles. SLOOOOOOOOOOWWWW, right? But like I said, with time, that will get faster.

3. Fitness aerobic. For me that’s 159-171 bpm. This is the range to improve aerobic endurance. Currently, this zone is most comfortable for me. It’s about an 11:30 mile. I want that to improve. Yesterday, after four miles of Zone 2, I switched to Zone 3 for about .75 miles. And it was comfortable.

4. Anaerobic. For me this is 171-184 bpm. This is for fitness, not weight loss. This pushes your heart to work harder. I have no idea where I am with this range. I haven’t hit it since I started heart rate training.

5. Max. For me this is 184-196 bpm. You can’t really maintain this speed long. It’s for interval training. If I haven’t hit anaerobic, I definitely haven’t hit this.

This is all theory. I don’t really know if it’s been studied or proven. Google didn’t tell me that, but here are links to the two articles I read in preparation for this post.

http://www.active.com/fitness/Articles/Calculate_your_training_heart_rate_zones

http://www.marathonguide.com/training/articles/HeartMonitorTraining.cfm

Whether or not it’s legitimate, it’s given me a new drive with running. I’m actually excited about my runs. For starters, I'm slow, so to have a reason to be slow is great. It makes me more patient with myself. Which I need.

I went out yesterday. Mistake. I’ve never been so cold and wind blown. My whole arms were numb when I finished. I couldn’t feel my wrists. I had to let them come to before driving. The wind was so sharp sometimes that I shrieked. And I didn’t even think about gloves the night before when I was putting my bag together, so I ran with my hands tucked into my sleeves. And the snot! Prolific! I dreaded my watch beeping to tell me my heart rate was too high because that meant walking and walking meant being cold longer. I kept on, though. How satisfying.