Heartrate & Lactic Threshold pace

I've had a HRM for 3+ years now and have totally abandoned it in terms of any usefulness. Mostly this is after reading Daniels' Running Formula. Basically, he says HRMs can be useful if understood properly. You have to understand that heart rate can vary with:

weather

rest

sleep

time of day

hydration

and many other variables. If you are poorly rested and it is a hot day, and you got little sleep last night, and you went by a HRM for a LT run, you would not be going the same as if you went by LT pace. That's why for the past year I've been doing pace-based training. If I have a threshhold day, and I feel great, I hold back and run a nice relaxed workout at my measured pace. No faster. If I feel like shit, tough luck for me cause I'm gonna suck it up and go the same pace as if I felt perfect. I think Daniels doesn't get enough credit around here, but after a year of training under a Daniels-based program, I've had nothing but success.

lasse viren wrote:

Effort based training is shit. We are fools.

Speak for yourself

This is what I speak, running by a HR number on a watch (HR-effort training) is not how I believe most should train. Train by feelings,(Go by how you feel) not by a number of beats per minute that is on your watch. The old guys that post on here that were very good never, I could be wrong, trained with HRMs. How did they get so good? The only two things that matter are how do you feel & the time you turn at the end of each run/race. Your Heart is not a techometer or a speedometer, it is a pump. Your better off listening to your body's feelings of fatigue & get a feeling for the overall speed at which you are running.

We just went out and trained hard. But I am finding HR to be important for some training. Using the monitor last week I did a 30 minute tempo run and recorded HR every 400m. I started my first lap at 7 minute pace and ended at 6:10. My HR only was 10 beats faster. What that told me was I need to train faster and that my base is good. Speedwork will do me wonders. As a side I have asthma my lung capacity is 70% of a NORMAL male my age. This is a recent developement. Four weeks ago I couldn't run 20 minutes without having to walk. After 1 week on medication my 30 minute tempo started at 8 min/mile and finished at 6:50/mile and HR was 20 beats higher. So the monitor is confirming the meds are doing a decent job.

You sound like an old person that can't get the hang of the new technology. I'm surprised that you've learned how to use a computer.

The HRM is not perfect. Nor is effort based training a science, but I'm not convinced that we should abandon it. I believe an intelligent, patient individual can strike a balance between the readings on their HRM and what their legs and lungs are telling them. If nothing else, log your average HR on your runs and see if you can plot a trend.

Listen read my posts. I have owned/used three HRMs on & off since 1989. I don't think that HR is the way to go, maybe lactate levels, then I would have to spring for one of the new small hand held types, $$. Can you tell me where your MLSS (Max Lact Steady State)is only by HR? Quick where is your L2.5, L4 with your HRM? I didn't think so. Read Carl Fosters work with MLSS & HR, tell me what he said in his study. The more one thinks about a number on a watch, HR, I think you lose your "feel" of the pace during the workout. I read this board, listen to what Hodgie-san has to say, his way is the right way. Get a feel for the pace. The Heart is a pump, not a techometer. After 18 minutes on a 70* day where should your HR be during your Tempo run? Go by feel, or buy a lactate machine on second thought just better go by feel. Talk to you later, I am sure.

I do your agree with your opinion that it is not best overall measurement of your effort. Sadly, environmental factors do come into play, such as weather. When I encounter extreme weather, I use my warm-up readings, my first repeat, or my first few minutes of a tempo run to get a baseline for the rest of my workout. This is what I mean by striking a balance between HRM and your internal barometer.

While it is not the best tool, it offers the best empirical measurement for the price and lack of hassle.

lasse viren wrote:

This is what I speak, running by a HR number on a watch (HR-effort training) is not how I believe most should train. Train by feelings,(Go by how you feel) not by a number of beats per minute that is on your watch.

Been there. Done that. For 20 years or competitive running. It worked often. And it failed often.

Frequently, it had me running too hard on what should have been easy days. And I still can't hold myself back properly in the early stages of a marathon running by feel (though admittedly I've only being doing those for a short time). Hell, for the first 10 miles of a marathon, I feel like God. Then I feel like death boiled over.

I think you're taking this as an all-or-nothing proposition when it does not have to be that way. One need not become a slave to an HRM anymore than one need become a slave to a watch. I don't understand the near vehement rejection of what it nothing more than a measuring tool. But then again, I don't understand people who become slaves to their HRMs (or to their watches) either.

So I often run with an HRM. I don't sit there staring at it as I run. Most days I don't even look at it until after the r un. But on, say, Wednesday, when I've hard a hard workout the day before and I have a hard workout coming up, I'll check it from time to time to make sure that how hard I think I'm working corresponds to how hard I am working. Whatever the environmental conditions, if my heart is beating 20 bpm higher this run than the last run, I'm working significantly harder. Period. Usually you can feel that. Sometimes you cannot.