No
I was running a bit too quickly. It seems from the results my marathon HR is currently nearer 143bpm, with a pace of maybe 7:20, based on educated guesswork. With a few more weeks of tempo runs and aerobic work maybe it will go back up to its original 145bpm level.
The session I ran was 758m laps of the paths round the back of the leisure centre where the club trains. The others were doing paarlauf, running alternate laps in pairs. As I'd had a good interval session earlier in the week while coaching a tempo run, I decided it was my turn for a tempo run. So instead of alternating laps with my partner, I paced my partner for her lap and then carried on and ran my own lap at the same pace. I found myself running with a couple of others and it was clearly getting a bit competitive, so I ended up running a little faster than maybe I should have.
Still the results are quite promising. My HR was drifting up a little, so 7:07/mile is clearly faster than marathon pace, as I knew it would be. My pace for a given HR looks good though as it is pretty much what I was running before the injury. Hopefully a marathon pace of 7:15/mile is realistic.
I'll rerun the test next week, going much further though, maybe 7-8 miles, and running a little slower, 7:15-7:20/mile, so that hopefully I see a constant HR.
4.7 miles marathon pace 10x758m continuous:
| Lap time | Heart rate | Pace |
|---|---|---|
| 3:28 | no HR | 7:21/mile |
| 3:20 | no HR | 7:04/mile |
| 3:23 | no HR | 7:11/mile |
| 3:22 | 144bpm | 7:08/mile |
| 3:20 | 144bpm | 7:04/mile |
| 3:21 | 145bpm | 7:06/mile |
| 3:20 | 145bpm | 7:04/mile |
| 3:20 | 146bpm | 7:04/mile |
| 3:21 | 146bpm | 7:06/mile |
| 3:18 | 146bpm | 7:00/mile |
| Average pace | 7:07/mile | |
One final comment: it seemed like I was breathing almost as hard as some of the others I ran the session with, with them running at their 10k or 5k pace. This captures an important point about endurance training. We were roughly the same weight so, ignoring running economy for a moment, need roughly the same energy expenditure to propel us at that speed. This means we have roughly the same oxygen requirement hence the same rate of breathing. These are gross generalisations you understand, as running economy is of course important.
Why then could I keep going lap after lap when the others needed recoveries? The answer lies with the lactate threshold. By training one's aerobic system with lots of slow running, and frequent tempo/threshold running we enable the body to work faster and faster at ever higher heart rates without accumulating lactate, hence raising the lactate threshold.
For marathon running we need bags of endurance to last the distance, but if we want to run our fastest marathon then we need to work on our lactate threshold so that we can sustain a good pace. Go and bang out those miles, but don't forget the tempo runs!
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