Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Nike Plus

So let me tell you about two of my birthday presents.



One is a Polar Heart Rate Monitor. You wear a belt around your chest that reads the beats of your heart and a watch that gives you the data. When I'm running I really don't notice the belt, so I do like it. I'm surprised that my heart rate is as high as it gets. I'm usually in the 140's to the mid 150's, but I peak out around 170. It gives me my heart rate at any given time and at the end of the run it gives me the high and average HR and how many calories I burned.



But, it does not give me lap time or splits. So, I did what any body would do. I bought myself a present. It's a Nike Plus for the Ipod. Here's the way it works. I place a sensor in my shoe and a receiver on my Ipod nano. I calibrate it for my running gate and it tells me when I go a mile, what my time and pace is. And it does this while I listen to my favorite tunes. I can get feedback at any point in my run and it will tell me at each mile or kilometer how I'm doing. Then I can download the info to a website and get even more info.



Now, you're supposed to have nike shoes that have a special place to put the sensor. The girl at 'The Finish Line' told me I had to use Nike's. But, I took my New Balances and cut into the mesh, inserted the sensor and tied it closed. It works beautifully. Here's a photo of my Ipod gear.



So, my first run with the Nike Plus was the New Times 5k. I didn't calibrate it before the race, so it was off a bit. The second run with the new gear was a 3 miler, in which, I calibrated the sensor. It worked like a charm. I ran it at a 12:07 pace. The third run was the TnT Track workout tonight. I ran 3.56 miles in a little over 51 minutes. That included the walking time inbetween each 5 minute run.

Movie Time: "You're never too old to go to space camp." The family went to see Stranger Than Fiction, the new movie with Wil Ferrell. This one is well worth seeing.

4 comments:

J~Mom said...

I love running gear!! Great presents! Thanks for the movie tip!

MNFirefly said...

Awesome birthday gifts!

Phil said...

Pat .. congrats on your new toys. One thing I'd recommend is to figure out your max HR. The standard formula is only an average computed to enusre that 90% of the population has a max HR with 20 BPM of the number computed.

I used the following work out to get to mine:

1) Find a 600m hill with a grade of 5% or greater.
2) Sprint up hill for 600m and jog back down to the start
3) Repeat step 2 three times. When you get to the top on the third repeat you'll be totally gassed and most likely within 2 or 3 BPM of your max HR.

Your max HR is genetically programed and you can't do anything about it. It will slow down as you get older (boo .. hiss) so you need to live with it.

Next figure out your resting HR. This is your HR when you first wake up int the morning. BEFORE you get out of bed. It is your minimum HR. The HR required to keep your body functioning when it is not under any stress. The difference between HRmax and HRrest is your available range.

Your general health will drive your restting HR down and improve your range. So although you can't do anything about your max HR, your range will improve as your general level of fitness improves.

The only other advice I can give you at the moment is to NOT focus on your actual pace unless you are running a tempo run. You need to learn to run by feel. I was once a gadget freak and wore my Garmin and my HR monitor on every run. I only wear my Garmin for tempo runs or if I'm running on an unfamiliar course or in a new city. I only wear my HR monitor when I want to check out my fitness. The rest of the time (including the New Times 10K) I only wear a simple sports watch and compute overall average pace via my training log (Running Ahead)

Great run by the way and congrats again on your 5k finish.

Unknown said...

Hi Pat- Happy birthday! I am jealous of your new toy - mine is the Garmin 301 and I do love it but I keep looking at the Nike Plus anyway.
My heart rate also is high when I run(180s or so), I simply try to ignore it since I can't seem to improve it - LOL.
Thanks for all your nice words - you are a very kind person.