Monday, June 22, 2009

Long Run #5 - 8 miles

Had a great long run today. I had planned on running it this evening, but as I looked at the weather.com I realized it would be better to do it before noon. Usually 11:00AM is still too hot, but it was about 72 degrees and not too humid, so I thought I would go ahead. Glad I did because the weather felt good. It was sunny, but there was a nice breeze. I ran 8 miles on the Kanawha Boulevard, nice and flat with great scenery. I ran from Drug Emporium near the Patrick Street Bridge to the State Capitol and back. I felt good througout the whole run and kept a pretty constant pace.

Stats on http://connect.garmin.com/activity/7429241
Total miles: 8
Average pace: 11:20 min/mile
Total time: 1:30:42
Calories burned: 966
Ave HR: 168

My heart rate seems to always be too high on my long easy runs. I just couldn't get myself to slow down. I still felt great at this pace. I'm hoping with continued training it will start to come down.

Next run: Wednesday - easy 2 miler/hills at the end
Total miles this week: 8

5 comments:

  1. Good job with the run! I can contest, 530 pm 8 miler was HOT, HOT, HOT last night! I ran about a 12:35 pace (I walked a lot). But I finished and really thats the only thing that matters!

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  2. Great job girl! As you add mileage you'll slow down a bit, but it's great that you are getting comfortable at the right pace.

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  3. Nice run -- 8 miles at 168 is a tough workout. I am kind of obsessed with heart rates and their correlation with performance, so always interested in them.
    And speed is all relative. I am slow compared with alot of runners, and it is pretty humbling to run a great race and finish 575, and 77th in my age group. We all race ourselves and challenges ourselves, and that is what matters.

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  4. There is no single consensus on the proper heart rate for a long run as far as I can tell. I have used the McMillan Pace calculator to calculate Paces and also looked at the Daniels Running formula for guidance as well as other books. (You can Google them to read about them.) I try to keep my long run heart rate close to 80% of Max HR. (I've seen recommendations from 65% of max to 85% of max to running at marathon pace.)
    My max is unusually high for my age, or around 188. So I try to average around 150. The benefits of that HR are that I end up going much slower than I normally would, and the recovery is much easier. Both recovery physically (like my old achy knees dont ache as much) and I am not completely wiped out that day after running.

    That is why I commented on 8 miles at 168, which is probably close to 90% HR. That is a tough workout, for me anyways.

    Good luck and keep up the training! I have learend that HR is meaningless if I don't get out there and run!

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  5. Have you recovered from the 8mile? I'm getting there....I'm having a little leg issue but, still went out for a 2 mile and steps tonight :) Keep it up gal!

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