Am I Doing this Right?

What happened to my long weekend? Sad that I had to welcome Monday again so quickly. The time flew by - I didn't even have time to check in yesterday. I think it might have been the first day since I started this blog that I missed writing a post!

It was the good type of busy though - one where I got to welcome friends I haven't seen in ages in the morning, still hit the gym and do some window shopping in the afternoon, spend some time with my mother in the evening, and then catch up with good friends back up north via FaceTime before bed.

I also have had some time to play with my new Apple Watch over the last two days.  (Update - I didn't get the Polar A360 as I said I was going to on Black Friday.  The coupon code didn't work.) This allowed me to give heart rate training as suggested by the Maffetone Method a try yesterday. Here are some initial observations:

• I had been warned that I'd need to go slow, but I never realized HOW slow. Normally, I run between a 6.0-6.5 mph pace on the treadmill. After just a few seconds at that pace, my heart rate jumped up into the 160 range. I ended up needing to keep my pace 4.2-4.5 mph in order to stay in the 135-145 range that the Maffetone Method suggests I need to be in. For me, this feels like just a tick above speedwalking.
• There's no way for me to really know whether or not the Apple Watch is accurately monitoring my heart rate, but it provided readings consistent with the handle bar heart rate monitor on the treadmill I was using. This, of course, really means nothing because they both could just be plain wrong.
• The Apple Watch needs to be calibrated outdoors using your phone's GPS before getting accurate treadmill readings (the Exercise app told me I did over 4 miles in the 45 minutes I was on the treadmill, when it was closer to 3 miles). I'm going to try running outside tomorrow with my phone to see if I get a better reading, and then try the treadmill again on Wednesday to see if there is a change.
• I still have a lot of questions about proceeding with this type of training. I noticed I was a bit sore after running at this slow pace for 45 minutes. I am not typically sore after a run - is going more slowly the cause? How long will it take before I can start running at my former speed? Do I need to still incorporate "rest days" into my training, or should I do this every day?

We'll keep the experiment going for a while, but so far, I'm enjoying changing things up a bit.

138 days left.

Today's Exercise:  Active Rest Day