There’s too much confusing (for a noob like me) information online about heart rate zones. Some have 3, 4, or 5 zones. Some calculate percentages as relative to max while others as relative to the reserve range.
Is my understanding correct that percentages of heart rate reserve — the [resting, max] interval — is just more accurate? I ask in part because, say, 70% of reserve capacity is more aggressive than 70% of max HR, and for one, I’d like to be conservative about avoiding overtraining.
What percentage of what HR do you use to draw the boundary line between “easy” vs. “not easy”? And what percentage (like 80%?) of your miles/time/what-not do you aim to run easy?
Also, what percentage do you run at or near threshold?
Do the zone boundaries and easy percentage advice apply as-is to beginners as well? Or are beginners advised to push harder because they have more room for quicker improvement compared to well trained runners? Most of the zone pace cues — like threshold pace is X seconds slower than 5K or 10K pace — makes little sense to me because they seem designed for 15- or 30-minuters respectively, and that’s just superhuman for me.
Thanks for your advice.