Big Steve's Group (Year Two) - CLOSED (Page 17)

Definitely seeing improvements in my HR over the past few weeks.  Today I ran the same course as before and saw around 8-20 bpm lower compared to my previous try, including a fast lap that was 2 min/mi faster than last time.  I'll do this in another few weeks and see if the change is consistent.  Zone 2 training seems to have helped.  Thanks for the advice Everlong.

That's some great progress. Keep up the great work.

You should monitor your heart rate while doing different things because it tells you a lot about your improvements and how fatigued you are. 

Lying down: 45

Sitting: 55-60

Standing 72-75

Light stretching 75-80

So these numbers are really consistent for me. This morning I turn on the heart rate monitor and I'm just standing and it comes back at 82, rot-row. I knew I was extra fatigued which isn't a surprise as I'm starting my recovery week and this is generally true. Knowing this though I started my recovery run on the treadmill at 5.0 pace not 5.5. My heart rate the first mile was in the 160's which is OK because heart rate isn't a true indicator of effort until you're 20 minutes in. So at about 8 minutes my heart rate drops precipitously from 160 to105 in about 20 seconds. Now I know I'm warmed up and I go up every two minutes from 5.0 to 5.6 and finish out my 5.5 miles there.

The other part of it is your resting heart rate, which is lying down, might be 60 now, who knows, but in six months you're lying down and it's 55. Just off of that you know you're made some significant fitness gains.

My training partner and about two years ago used to do three miles on the treadmill or a 3 mile outside run we always did at 9/mile pace. Our heart rate would be in the 170's for just about the duration. We were over-training for our fitness level. It was really hard to extend any distance. It's funny because we were reflecting on this just this morning. Saturday we went out and ran 15 miles @ 8:54/mile and 150 average heart rate. So 5X the distance and 25 beats per minute less heart rate. All it takes is consistency and training in your zones. Sometimes you look at your weekly or monthly gains, and I'm so guilty of this, and you think man I'm just stuck at this plateau WTF? Why aren't I getting gains. Then you take a more long term view and it's like ahhh ok this is paying off by being slow and steady and avoiding injuries.

How many miles on the bike?

Rough week. Thought I was over a cold and it came back to destroy me for a few days. Felt better just in time to do a nice 40 mile ride on Saturday. I'm running today at lunch and riding after work. Heres my totals for the week:

Awesome week folks!!  Keep it up!

We're @ 1943 bike miles for the month.  I hate to break up the week but we'll need to in order to hit our 2012 miles goal.  I'm sure between all of us we can put in 69 miles today and tomorrow!!

probably 13miles.  I was really taking it easy...

I had 25.05 miles on Sunday that aren't in my total from last week. That's all I'll be able to contribute. My month is done. The way the month set up I'm actually 35 miles shorter on the bike than December but set a new monthly run total. Today was 3050 in the pool followed by 4.5 on the treadmill. Recovery week was certainly needed.

Cervelo and Felt are the most popular. If you have the money to get a B series I'd certainly do it.

That's the best when that happens or when you're on a long run and you look down at your Garmin for the first time in a while and you think I'm probably at 6 and you're nearly at 7.

I have the Felt B16 and I really like it, I think it comes down to what you like they all have something a little different. I thought the Felt was more bang for your buck on the componants. Trek was nice but the price vs componants got expensive. Cervelo had a good price on the p2 when I was looking, they just didn't have my size. If you can ride all of them that is what I would do. The hard part is the LBS having your size to ride.

I heard that Cervelo was giving a $1000 off if you buy 2 bikes? Not sure if you know anyone else looking?

Masters gets a lot easier with time and is well worth the effort if you can fit it in. The first time I did masters I was too stupid\proud to sit out any of the intervals. I did 2100 yards in an hour and was hypoxic for 2000 of them and that was in the slowest lane. I've moved up 3 lanes since and usually lead at least a quarter of the workout and up to three-quarters on a day I'm feeling really good. There's no way I would have seen those gains without it.

Having the format and others to push you especially on days you're not feeling up to snuff is invaluable.

I'm taking tomorrow off so these are my totals for my recovery week. I still feel kind of beat up coming off of last week where I really pushed hard on some workouts. I'm hoping some light stretching, massage and hot tub tomorrow refresh me.

Needed to do hill repeats this morning but wimped out on going outside so did it on the treadmill.  5 mile run and threw in 30 to 45 seconds @ 5% incline once every mile.  Ending up averaging a 10:29 pace.  Slow but steady.

Ummmm, no.

Can't decide? My Niners let the Giants squeeze in, but not really a Pats fan and too many obnoxious fans at work?