But that is besides the point. As you know, I started my marathon training yesterday, but didn't have anything to report as it was Rest Day. Well, I have been looking forward to my first training run today for two reasons.
1) It marks the beginning of my training. (Obvi)
2) My Garmin Forerunner 305 arrived today! I FINALLY GOT ONE! :)
I was really stoked on the Garmin to help with the training. My plan for today was 8X400 meters at 8:09-8:11 pace. I completed the run. So how did I fail, you ask?
Truth be told, it was the long-awaited Garmin that messed me up. I have no idea how to use it to my advantage. I uploaded all my personal info, and even figured out how to get it to beep every 400 meters (0.25 miles) I am pleasantly surprised at how accurate the Garmin spits out distance. OK, now the problem lies in Pacing. It kept jumping from 11:24 to 8:34 to 7:09 to 6:59. I was even running sub 6:00 at one point. WTF? I am usually a 9 minute pace person. I could not figure out how fast I was running for the life of me! The pace just kept changing on me all the time! I ended up running all my repeats WAAAAAAYYYYY too fast and hurting my knees. I am going to be sore tomorrow! And at the end of my workout, which was a total of 4.5 mile run and .5 mile walking cool down, I could not figure out how fast I ran each mile.
PLEASE ADVISE: What am I doing wrong?
Am I supposed to press the "Lap" button every time I do a repeat? How am I supposed to know how fast I'm going? How do I make sure I stay within my pacing zone? Why does my pace keep jumping around all over the place?
...woahhhhhh so many questions! I know, I know. But I am not the most technologically savvy person, so I would love some help in that department from all the pro Garmin users out there. Because right now, I am contemplating running on the dreaded dreadmill for my repeats, because at least I can keep a constant pace on the tready. So please. I beg of you. Help me!! >_<
Well besides the fact that my pacing sucked, the run was good; I was surprised that I actually had some sort of speed in me. I'm so afraid of running fast because I am so paranoid about injuries. The 4 miles literally FLEW by! I ran fast for .25 miles, and did a slow jog for .25 miles, and repeated that 8 times. It was actually kind of fun! (except for the fact that I ate a snack right before I left for the run and almost puked. Note to self..... DIGEST!!! haha)
I am also going to be posting my training schedule on the right-hand sidebar.
Oh and another thing; I am trying to lose the 5 pounds I gained while I was sick a couple of weeks ago, before I race in Maui. I was hoping it was water weight, but clearly, it was not water. I've got about 10 weeks till Maui, which translates into a 0.5 lbs loss/week, which is pretty sensible. This will get me back to the weight I was for the half marathon I ran in May. I think losing 5 lbs will help me reach the 6 minutes I'm trying to slash off my time. Clearly I struggle with the nutrition department, though I'm not quite sure what I'm doing wrong. Oh well. Good bye chocolate chip muffins! Hello celery sticks!
Tomorrow is bike day and date night with James. We always try to plan something for Wednesday/Thursday so that we have something to look forward to during the week. It makes the week so much more fun knowing you don't have to wait till the weekend to have a good time. We are going to a steakhouse, so I am very excited :)
Well, again, please advise me on the Garmin issue. I would really appreciate feedback. As for me, I'm off to read my new issue of OXYGEN magazine to read about fat-blasting recipes!
See ya runners!
Julia, it sounds like your pace setting is showing actual pace versus lap pace. Go into the settings and change what is showing on the watch to lap pace and you won't see things jumping around so much. Settings>General>Data Fields> and then select the menu (there are 3). Pick whichever one you want. Keep clicking enter until you get to the screen where you select what you actually want to view and pick Pace-Lap. Your screen keeps jumping around because it is showing Actual Pace and that changes constantly because of your arm swinging and your overall movement. This should fix that for you.
ReplyDeleteYou also want to make a change in the settings so that it records each mile as a lap automatically so that you can see your mile splits. Training>Training Options>Auto Lap>Auto Lap Trigger should be set to By Distance and Lap At should be set to 1.00 mile
Enjoy your Garmin!
I was going to write everything sneakersister wrote about the Garmin. I usually keep things very basic with the Garmin. It work nicely on the bike too.
ReplyDeleteHave fun on date night. Cute idea tossing it in the middle of the week.
This is what I am going to be doing today except I dont have the garmin so I am thinking of getting on the dreadful treadmill.. You get that garmin thing all figured out and then maybe I'll get one and you can help me figure it out hahaha!! Good job on your run.. Sorry about the knee's.. I can so sympathize with you..
ReplyDeleteagreed with d10 and sneakersister. when i do 400's i usually don't look at my pace so much as i do the time. (the pace thing sometimes freaks me out, especially if i am just having a good day and want to go a tad faster)
ReplyDeleteso say for example you want to run a 400 in 2:04, just make sure to look down at your garmin when you hit 200. it should say (obviously) 1:02. adjust accordingly.
Sneakersister offered all of the advice I would have re: the Garmin. I hope you get it figured out.
ReplyDeleteCongrats on your first official marathon training run!
o man! hope you're not hurting too much today!! happy day one of marathon training :)
ReplyDeleteif you download the Garmin Training Center (or, a disc should have come with the 305), you can create a workout that includes the interval, your desired pace, and recovery intervals. then, the Garmin will basically tell you what to do, i.e., run 0.25mile at 8:09 to 8:11 pace. if you put in a particular pace, the Garmin will beep to alert you if you are going too fast or too slow. it also beeps to tell you when the end of an interval is coming up, and will display the previous interval's pace, so you can know if you need to adjust your pace the next time around.
ReplyDeletemy only advice beyond that is your interval is pretty narrow, so the Garmin will be beeping like crazy to try to keep you at the speed. if you do use the GTC, i'd open up the interval a bit, say 8:03 to 8:17, you won't have to hear the beeps quite as much :)
good luck! the Garmin is an amazing tool ... it revolutionized my running :)
I have a Garmin 405, so can't give much advice on a 305, but will say that it is both great and a learning experience. I also highly, highly recommend SportTracks to upload and view your data rather than the Garmin software. SportTracks is awesome.
ReplyDelete