I have completed the Couch to 5k program. I haven’t actually ran a 5k race yet, but I have completed the program and can easily run 30 minutes or longer. Of course my pace is very slow but that is not what is important at this stage. The Couch to 5k program is about building endurance, and that’s what it did. Now I can take this new base line I have and build upon it by running farther every week and maybe trying to run a bit faster.
The Garmin Forerunner is a great tool for endurance training. I realized that I was not as progressing as fast as I should because I was actually training too hard. I was running a bit too fast and as a result my heart rate was indicating that I was in the anaerobic zone instead of in the aerobic zone where I should have been. I was spending more than half of my training going too fast and burning myself out. By using the Garmin Forerunner 305 to track my heart rate I was able to keep it in Zone 3 (the aerobic zone) where it belongs. In zone 3 your body is using oxygen (and sugar) to supply energy to your muscles. By spending long periods of time in this zone, your body gets better at delivering oxygen to your muscles, building your overall fitness and endurance.
The better you are aerobically, the longer you will be able to train at just about any sport, not just running. No matter if you are biking, swimming, or lifting your muscles need oxygen and the better your body is at delivering that oxygen the better off you will be.
The Garmin Forerunner has alerts that you can use to make sure you don’t drift out of the zone you are in. I set mine to sound an alert whenever my heart rate drifted into Zone 4. This let me know that I need to ease up a bit to stay in the proper heart zone for building endurance. While I didn’t think it looked impressive running that slowly, at least I knew that my heart and blood supply was getting better with every step.
