Heart rate monitor training (Read 795 times)

Howdy- I'm trying to learn how to put my HR monitor to good and proper use. My current goal is to do my first 50K in May 2008. Does anybody have any rules of thumb for how often I should be in different target zones (percent of max) during training? For runs to date I've tended to be in the mid-80% of max range (decent pace, reasonable effort) but someone recently told me that during regular runs I should actually go much slower to stay in the 70% range instead and then to shoot for 90-95% for intervals/hills/speed work for short periods of time. He said if I stick to mostly 80% range I'll never get any faster - Is this true? Looking forward to hearing your thoughts. Thanks.

the Low Heart Rate training group.

http://runningahead.com/groups/LOWHRTR/

I don't know that you'll NEVER get faster, but the theory is that it's too much unnecessary stress. A study came out a few months ago, showing that folks with lots of easy mileage and 1-2 speed sessions per week tended to improve in speed more than those doing harder runs. You can poke around for the news item on Runner's World, or if I remember, I'll do it. Both Hal Higdon and Jack Daniels have a fair amount to say on the topic, also. Hal Higdon has his own website - to get Jack Daniels' words, you'll have to pick up his book on training - VERY worth it.

...or go to Letsrun.com and search for Jtupper, who is J Daniels' pen name there... Steve