Modifying the Norwegian approach to lower mileage

It's just a neat gadget, but it's not power. That's probably the point. It's very good marketing from Stryd. You are, I think, arguing with one of the people who most understands what "real" power could bring to running (former hour record holder?) rather than this bastardization of it. Cycling power is the standard it should be held to. In that, if can replicate readings for any person, in all conditions, without anything ludicrous like having to account for the wind. That's just insane, really and why anyone thinks something with a little wind sensor is going to work on the foot is pure lol. Even if running and cycling are different, in should be applicable to all people, in any situation and read the same, but it does not do that and the way it works never will.

People keep linking papers but forget the incredible amount of people who have bought one and found it not to be anywhere near as good as any research suggests.

Stryd seems to fit a narrow range of people, which is great for them. But the algorithm sucks for a lot of us. I think most people's annoyance is the fact Stryd call it "power", which is obviously a joke to call it that. It's a fancy foot pod. Although, this is why they sell, "power" sounds better than "overpriced foot pod".

Good luck pacing a race to Garmin power. You are missing the key points. The numbers are NOT an even representation for most people or consistent.

Go run 300w into 25km/h winds on a Garmin or a Stryd and then turn around and try running 300w. The effort will be nowhere near the same, for most people. Go cycle 300w both ways and you will have paced a race perfectly. I do hope people actually understand this, because this is incredibly important and you will only really understand this is you have experienced both the good snd the bad.

There is really some poor advice in this thread from real maths boffins who have absorbed all of the theory, have confirmation bias on themselves as some people for neatly into being a test subject, but forget that for the majority of people it's trash.

You can tell the people who have used and understood what power actually is in a practical sense in other environments, versus runners who have picked up "power" and think it works.

I would just add to the discussion , whilst power on my Stryd is wildly inaccurate to not even be worth an ounce of use in a race, it's very useful if im working away to give me an idea of pace on different treadmills. Better than any of the other pods. It's probably almost as good as the Runn sensor, or close enough that the more plug and play nature of it makes it more applicable if you run on different mills. It's just probably the best foot pod out there, rather than being anything spectacular.

That's actually not quite true because speed does not have a linear relationship to drag. The best pacing for a headwind/tailwind is generally higher wattage into the wind and then lower wattage with a tailwind. That being said, you can do some simple modeling with websites like bestbikesplit and use power to pace the race perfectly.

As mentioned, I don't really care about whether it is "power" or not. My question is very specific to how the book suggests modifying paces based on elevation and wind, and whether the Garmin power algorithm simplifies the approach (after you've correlated power and pace using workout data). I tried using the tables for races and workouts, and while doable, it's a lot of effort that seemingly introduces as much or more error than a watch sensor would.

This is also explained in the book:

You can say that until you are blue in the face, but you'll still be wrong.

Stryd measures power based on physics. You can question the accuracy and precision of those measurements, or whether they are needed in the first place, but there is no getting around that simple fact.

[Ironically, many criticize the fact that Stryd uses an accelerometer and not a strain gage. This, despite the fact that both are electronic sensors that generate a signal proportional to the material deformation resulting from application of force.]

When interpreting such data it's important to keep in mind that the wind speed at ground level is a lot lower than stated in weather reports.

Except that Stryd can't tell when you're running up a grade on a treadmill. You have to use their app and tell it that to account for the extra power.

Only very, very slightly, though. You're therefore best off just ignoring the wind and focusing on the terrain, which is what really matters.

Doubly so for runners, who go a lot slower.

Yeah, for all the jacking around and uncertainty, you might as well just pace by HR.

You and I have a similar max HR and fitness. For reference I'm close to turning 52 and my max HR is 181. I would be pretty close to those paces at the same HR. I think you ran it near perfect for your first attempt. I've been doing this method for 3.5 months and I would say my "ideal" HR for the 3*10 is around 148, 153 and 156 (+/- 3 bpm per rep).

So I think you'll have some wiggle room to run them a bit faster, but of course doing 3 of these types of workouts per week is a totally different beast than 1, so better to start off on the conservative side. I think you'll find that you can occasionally dip over 160 bpm and recover just fine, but ideally you will not hit that until the final rep(s).

As many others have said throughout this thread, running the easy runs very easy is critical. For reference, my sweet spot easy pace HR tends to average in the 113-115 range (62-63% of max)...usually around 8:50-9:10 pace.

Good luck!

Fwiw, my Coros pace watch gets a lot more stable power readings than my Stryd, which can be way off when the incline goes more than a percent or two or the wind is anything more than a light breeze. The Coros is great value for this alone, as an extra piece of data, rather than just a Garmin + a stryd pod which combined will almost be double the cost.

Also, pace is going to be the best metric to decide what to do in a race, without doubt.

Absolutely nobody can go out and pace a race from the 1st km to the last on HR. You can of course have a glance, but honestly, looking at it to pitch your correct intensity for a race is a disaster waiting to happen, much like power (when it works it's OK, when it doesn't work , you just ruined your race).

With pace, you can even use your workouts to aim for where you should be in a race, for an appropriate distance and it's pretty simple to calculate it in relation to the conditions. So in that sense, it's the most logical and straightforward.

People are way over complicating things, when you try to bring in a metric like power that is to temperamental for so many folks. Especially for racing.

Yes, I am shocked to find people are suprised by this and that they think with stuff like wind, hills, it all evens out. There are people who genuinely think that.

A lot of top coaches have adjusted target paces for conditions for decades. I had a coach in the early 90s who gave me a paper chart with equivalents on. It's effort, but for racing it's a no-brainer and you are going to race a better race. It's that simple.

I'll second the coros, it seems better than my Garmin for 'power'. But I sure as hell wouldn't trust it in a marathon on race day, for something I had been training got, for 6 months. No sir.

To this comment: "With pace, you can even use your workouts to aim for where you should be in a race, for an appropriate distance and it's pretty simple to calculate it in relation to the conditions. So in that sense, it's the most logical and straightforward. People are way over complicating things, when you try to bring in a metric like power that is to temperamental for so many folks. Especially for racing."

The book suggests running workouts on a track, flat surfaces, or an out and back. I agree it is easy to calculate paces when you know the gain/loss and you're dealing with 3/6/10 minute intervals.

I don't agree this is easy for races of sufficient length and elevation gain/loss. Before reading the book, I had regularly shown up to races with no real strategy, other than having a goal pace based on my estimated VDOT. This worked fine when I lived somewhere that was pan flat, but not fine once I moved to an area with rolling hills. If I'm planning to run a half marathon with rolling hills, and I want to follow the pacing strategy book, I need to break the race down into segments with comparable elevation gain/loss, calculate the pace for each, and then remember that during race day. That's just not particularly feasible (IMO) for courses that are rolling (up, down, up, down, etc.). Someone suggested Garmin PacePro, which I do think could help, but I don't love the idea of each segment being a "lap". I don't think this discussion is "overcomplicating it", if you agree with being as rigorous as sirpoc laid out in the book, but sirpoc is about as rigorous as they come.

I’d note that training paces are derived from a race performance, a time trial, or a fitness test. The more similar (or identical) the conditions of those events to the conditions of the training, the fewer adjustments need to be made.

I think the book does a good job of emphasizing that there are many reasons you may run a workout slower, which is good because it gets people to err on the side of caution.

Also it’s only in the beginning that all these adjustments matter for training. Once sustainable training has been established, the athlete ought to develop a sense or a feel for how to run the workouts. Anyone excessively calculating and sticking to a goal pace for each workout will fail to develop this sense. That said, it’s still useful and frankly common sense for an experienced runner to slow down for slow conditions rather than mindlessly run a normal pace until their body gives them feedback that it’s too hard.

The key to pacing races perfectly depends on both these things (running workouts by feel and adjusting based on conditions). By running workouts by feel, you can get an honest sense of fitness progression. So if you ran a race 3 months ago at a certain pace and ran a workout 3 months ago at a certain pace, you can take current (faster) workout pace of the same workout and predict a faster race pace. Then consider the conditions of the race compared to the conditions of the training to make adjustments for the start of the race. Then if you know how, eventually transition to running the race by feel. Otherwise stick to the calculated pace while you gain race experience.

Yes, exactly. Very specific circumstances where Stryd has been useful. I only use it on the treadmill. What matters to me is my intraindividual consistency or change. If I used the same treadmill for all my workouts, Stryd wouldn't be that useful for tracking workouts and finding the appropriate load for week-to-week/month-to-month progression. However, it's been really useful when I've had to use other treadmills at the gym or elsewhere. Like pace and heart rate, it's just another metric that is helpful to compare with past performances in similar conditions. It's not perfect, obviously MUCH less precise than power sensors on a bike and I find it wonky/inconsistent when running outside. However, I find that it can be helpful if you use it intelligently––just like the other metrics I use to approximate daily/weekly load.

Just finished the book. Really excellent, chapters on pacing and racing.

Question: As a UK expat I have to make do with sh**e US “candy”. No access to the Mars bars or choccie digestives that fuel Sirpoc’s amazing performances. Will this hold me back?