I’ve had my watch about 6 weeks now and I’ve just started to try to recommend workouts to see if they make any difference.
Just wondering if people use the suggested workouts or whether they’re just a bit rubbish? How do I know if the suggestions are accurate for what I need?
Interestingly the opposite reason is why I’ve ignored them until now - it would suggest runs at a pace that were below what I’d normally run at so, and I just didn’t want to run that “slow”. However, I think they may be for my benefit to perhaps slow down a bit and also follow the interval training. So I dunno if I’m just wasting my time with it or what!
You’re actually supposed to do more easy runs than “normal pace” runs. Helps build up your aerobic base and prevent injury. I’ve heard something like 80% of your training should be easier pace.
For me it took a while to find a groove and enjoy easy runs, but I had no choice due to a hamstring injury (from overtraining). Now I appreciate them just as much as tempo or harder runs. And I can actually go a little faster now at easy pace, where before I’d have to stop and walk to keep my heart rate down.
Yeah I recently read about the 80% thing too. It’s difficult not to just go a bit faster just because you know you can! Although I do like that the watch “tells you off” for going too fast when using the workout which is nice.
When you say overtraining, how much were you doing? I see some people running every day and I have no idea how they’re doing it, I try to stick to 3 runs a week, 4 at most, with a day off in between.
I don’t really use the Garmin recommendations, but a friend helped me get slightly better recommendations.
By default, Garmin creates HR zones based on % of max HR. Set this way, it was suggesting that I do most runs at a brisk walk.
In the User Settings of the device, you can define your HR zones by % of Heart Rate Reserve instead. I still don’t really use garmins recommendations, but at least now the recommendations are a more reasonable pace.