A Beautiful Day to Honor my Heart..

79°, SSE 6mph, 38% humidity, DP 49%

Wow! What a beautiful day on the east coast!
I worked a half day, and decided that I would go for a HR run when I got home. I picked up my book, found the calculations I had made, and punched those numbers into a new activity on Runmeter. It seems that the runs I had tried previously I was attempting with too low a rate. Now that I have a better number for my max rate, this run, while still challenging, was definitely doable.
If I can keep my commitment and excitement level high, this just might enable me to run at least another 2 times a week. I'm just so SHOT when I get home from work. Emotionally, mentally, not so much physically. Perhaps I can reverse that trend with a 38 minute, 3 mile run - at ≤70% of my max.

That's exactly what I did today. So, the idea being, that after 4 weeks of adding this type of workout to my training, I should be able to do that 3 mile run in less time at the same heart rate. This would translate to better aerobic, fat burning metabolism (and sparing glycogen stores) for longer distances.
OooOOoh boy - this book is explaining everything in such a simple way. Truly, written for "Compleat Idiots" like me!

I was so surprised when Runmeter said that I reached 3 miles and the workout was over. I was not at all wondering when the run would be finished. All I was thinking about was standing tall (I was listening to a podcast describing running form from Runner Academy - the producers of one of the (IMHO) BEST podcasts out there), and the usual - not getting hit by a car, staying on the correct side of the road, etc. My breathing was natural and effortless, and nothing hurt.

A few times I let my HR get away from me - it must have been a natural byproduct of having plenty of energy (endurance) I suppose, from not taxing my heart overall on the run. 
Tomorrow is a 5 miler maintaining the same ≤70% rate. I can't wait. 

In other news, I recently bought, and demoed the Fitbit wrist band. Meh. I returned it after 2 weeks. The wristband did not have an intuitive display like the clip on model. I thought it was hard to use, and the website was unimpressive to me.

I am, however, really liking this new app for my iPhone - Argus. I use the pulse and sleep apps already by this company - and they incorporate that info plus steps taken, weather that day, calories burned, routes taken - just giving you an overall visual snapshot of your physical day. It will remind me to take my heart rate, or that it's been three hours since my last glass of water..

The only thing is that for some people, their phone is like an extra appendage. They take it with them where ever they go. For me, I forget to even charge it, or I leave it in my car, whatever. For the app to be effective to record the stats it needs to be useful, I really should keep it on my person most of the time.
Here is the screen shot for today.

You can see that because I use the sleep app every night, (bottom right) it also pulls in from my account with them how many hours I slept, and the approximate quality of my sleep. I love it.

Enjoy this beautiful weather, east coasters. Tomorrow promises to be another great day!