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Woohoo!! Made it through week 4 day 3 and I think I’m going to go to week 5 next week instead of doing week 4 again. 
Trying to keep my heart rate between 150 and 160 bpm really seemed to help. I wasn’t dying during any of my runs and they actually seemed to go by a bit quicker. I was even able to really push it the last 20 seconds of my last 5 minute run, which I wasn’t able to do on Monday or Wednesday. Next week has some pretty long runs, a 20 minute run on day 3, so I’ll let you know if watching my heart rate keeps me going through those runs.
As I suspected my pace/speed suffered during my jogging intervals. Here is a breakdown of my average pace and average heart rate during the 4 running intervals:
1st three minute run — 151 bpm and 10 minute 32 second mile
1st five minute run — 159 bpm and 11 minute 9 second mile
2nd three minute run — 161 bpm and 11 minute 29 second mile
2nd five minute run — 173 bpm and 10 minute 52 second mile
Since I wasn’t stressing my heart to the extreme I also felt a lot better today than I did on Wednesday. I was wiped out pretty much all day Wednesday after that days run while today I felt pretty good and didn’t even need to take a nap. 
If you are having trouble making it through your runs or are just dreading them I suggest keeping an eye on your heart rate during your running portions of the program and try and keep your heart rate between 70% to 80% of your maximum heart rate. The Polar website has a good calculator for your heart rate, just click on the “target zone calculator” on their homepage at polarusa.com.
Garmin Forerunner 305 stats for todays run:
Total workout time, including warm-up and cool-down: 34 Minutes
Average Pace: 1 mile in 12 minutes 41 seconds
Avg Speed/Max Speed: 4.7 mph/11.0 mph
Average Heart Rate: 153 bpm
Max Heart Rate: 194 bpm
Total Distance: 2.68 Miles
Calories Burned: 397
I will post week 4’s summary tomorrow, have a great weekend!
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Tags: couch-to-5k, running, fitness
Todays run was another series internal struggles. I knew I could finish the running portions because I did it on Monday. Yet, my body was screaming at my mind to quit about two to two and a half minutes into the runs. My mind won out, though, and forced the body to run through the pain and exhaustion. I’m not sure yet but I may just repeat this weeks runs because I’m finding it extremely difficult to keep going during the running portions of week 4.
Looking through my run statistics I see that I’ve kept the run intervals right around a 10 minute mile pace which is about where I want to be eventually but my average heart rate during these intervals would suggest that I’m not that fit yet. My average heart rate progresses like this:
1st three minute run — 157 bpm
1st five minute run — 170 bpm
2nd three minute run — 173 bpm
2nd five minute run — 184 bpm(yikes!)
From my research it looks like I want to keep my heart rate between 150 bpm and 160 bpm in order to be in my 70% to 80% range for improved aerobic fitness. I think I’m going to adjust my program a bit in the Garmin software to alert me when I go above 160 bpm and below 150 bpm during my jogging intervals. With time I’m sure my speed will pick up but at this point I think it’s going to be slow go for me. I think I’ll create a user on the c25k forums and see what others suggest and how they’ve overcome their trials in this program as well to get a bit more input.
Garmin Forerunner 305 stats for todays run:
Total workout time, including warm-up and cool-down: 34 Minutes
Average Pace: 1 mile in 12 minutes 06 seconds
Avg Speed/Max Speed: 5.0 mph/ 8.5 mph
Average Heart Rate: 160 bpm
Max Heart Rate: 190 bpm
Total Distance: 2.81 Miles
Calories Burned: 428
That’s it for this days post, I’ll let you know how my tweaks for my heart rate go on Friday.
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Tags: couch-to-5k, running, fitness
Todays run was pretty tough but I made it through it. The runs consisted of two 3 minute runs and two 5 minute runs. I tried to keep the pace between 9 minute 45 second miles and 10 minute 30 second miles. Even keeping the pace a bit slower my heart was racing and I was gasping for breath a few times… Now that I’m starting to get into the longer runs I think the difficulty is going to skyrocket for me, but I’m going to plug away and make it through. It’s possible that I might repeat week 4 again next week before going on to week five, I’ll have to see how I feel at the end of the week. I’ve also put a new link in the Blogroll today, a site called c25k.com. It’s a pretty neat site with some good articles, links to some podcasts for the program, and a great forum to go to which should provide some extra support in the quest to go from couch potato to a 5K runner. Please go on over and have a look, I think you’ll find the site helpful.
Garmin Forerunner 305 stats for todays run:
Total workout time, including warm-up and cool-down: 34 Minutes
Average Pace: 1 mile in 12 minutes 10 seconds
Avg Speed/Max Speed: 4.9 mph/ 8.6 mph
Average Heart Rate: 153 bpm
Max Heart Rate: 185 bpm
Total Distance: 2.79 Miles
Calories Burned: 418
It’ll be nice to get a day of rest before day two of this week. I’ll see you on Wednesday!
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Tags: couch-to-5k, fitness, running
