Heart Rate Training and Marathon Workouts

I’ll preface this by admitting that I was an English major and now pretend to be a scientist for much of the day yet, despite the intelligent scientific minds that I surround myself with, math still befuddles me much of the time and there will very likely be errors in everything from this point forward.

That being said, I’ve been trying to find a better way to focus my training efforts and have been considering the importance of heart rate training zones to get there. I spent some time reading and researching this concept this morning and wanted to write a few notes for reference so that I don’t have to repeat the math the next time I get a wild hair to work this out - and maybe (unlikely?) this will be useful to someone else who might stumble across it.

Maximum Heart Rate (MHR)
First, the calculation of maximum heart rate seems to be some great mystery involving your current age, your current leg length, and, the number of sexual partners that you had when you were between the age of 19 and 22 - or at least that was my take on how they arrived at the mystical numbers in the formula. I won’t even attempt to unravel this. For my MHR, I looked at the heart rate output from my Garmin 305 from my last tough interval session and noted that I reached 190 bpm at one point during the session. I also remember (vividly) that I felt like puking at the time and, because I never want to exceed that threshold (I hate puking), I’m going to call 190 my MHR. If you don’t feel like pushing yourself to the puke threshold, you can do your own research on the math tricks that will simulate puking and thereby derive your own magic number - I think pushing yourself to puking would be easier, but that’s just me.

Resting Heart Rate (RHR)
This one’s easier, well sort of. I actually have never taken my resting heart rate before my morning cup of coffee. Frankly, I can’t remember the last time that I did anything before my morning coffee - except make coffee. Maybe I could sleep with my heart rate monitor on? It’s unlikely that I’ll ever know if my heart is actually beating or not before my morning coffee so I’ll have to assume that my post-coffee RHR is close to my pre-coffee RHR. Anyway, I’m using 50 (probably more like 47 but I like the round number).

Working Heart Rate (WHR)
This is where I erred before. Generally, when you see training schedules that use heart rate as a method of measuring effort, they are using percentages of Working Heart Rate (WHR) rather than Maximum Heart Rate (MHR). WHR takes into account your resting heart rate - it may also just be a demonic math trick that some cranky coach dreamed up to make us work harder during our interval sessions. Anyway, percentages of WHR can be calculated with this nifty(?) formula. ((MHR-RHR) * % effort level) + RHR

i.e. to calculate a 75% effort level with my MHR and RHR numbers, the math would look something like this (remember, again, that I was an English major): ((190-50) * 0.75) + 50 = 155. So a workout that requires 75% effort would be done at 155 bpm on my heart rate monitor.

Or, you can skip all the math by using the Heartrate Target Zones Calculator from MarathonGuide.com The table that follows shows my Working Heart Rate Zones using 190 as my MHR and 50 as my RHR.

So, now, what the hell to do with these numbers (other than inspire awe and wonderment at parties). The general rule of thumb is that 65-75% is easy, 75-85% is moderate, and 85-95% is hard. Did I really need to go through all of that to arrive at this? Good god, I should have slept in this morning.

MarathonGude.com breaks the results down into 5 Training Zones:

I think I can translate this into the workouts that I have been doing as follows:

Interval
Intervals are contrived of short sessions at an intense level. Since there is a recovery time built into each interval, I think lactate threshold can be exceeded during the intense portion, and since I used my interval session to derive my MHR, I’ll set my interval heart rate zone to 90-100% (176-190bpm).

Tempo
The purpose of tempo runs should be to increase lactate threshold - I think this is done by numbing yourself to the pain incurred by running too far at lactate threshold, but that may just be my personal experience. Tempo runs should be done at lactate threshold - 80-90% (162-176 bpm)

Long
Long runs need to be done below lactate threshold (or I would never finish a long run) but should also be done at a higher level of intensity than a recovery run. Arthur Lydiard probably would have made me work harder here, but I think I need to stay safely under my lactate threshold in my long runs - 70-80% (148-162 bpm)

Recovery
And, most importantly, the recovery run - burning fat but resting muscle - 60-70% (134-148 bpm)

Jogging
This might seem silly, but I read that Arthur Lydiard actually recommended low intensity jogging as a second daily workout. Lydiard also recommended 100 miles per week of actual training, so I have to wonder how the hell anyone following Lydiard’s advice could find the time to jog. None-the-less, I think there may be a place for this zone occasionally in my schedule - 50-60% (120-134 bpm)

Or, for those who like tables:

So, there you have it. My take on heart rate training - I really do need more sleep.

*I feel the need to note than any intelligible information in this post has been blatantly stolen from other sources and the rest I just made up. I have no authority or expertise to suggest or recommend any programs mentioned and, frankly, probably won’t even use them myself. Any lawsuits should be directed at McDonalds Corp, as the bad coffee that I’m drinking as I write this is as much to blame for inspiration as anything else.