My lungs and breathing have never felt better

Not as much training as I planned this week, but had some key workouts completed. Trying to keep my power up while running, using the Stryd, power pod on my foot to measure just that.  

Synched with my Suunto Spartan, I can set a target heart rate or power output during a workout. 

I had a slower recover run last Monday, but still felt good afterwards. 

Thursday night, I set up my watch to keep me in my Zone 4 during a two mile run. I wanted to see first off what my power output in that zone is, and also hoped that keeping my heart rate there for the two miles would not have me totally gasping for a breath. 

It worked. I started off taking a little bit to get my heart rate up and then into my Zone 4.  An early downhill jaunt was not the trick, but quickly I had to work harder climbing up out a the area I was just in. Locked into my Zone 4 and just kept plugging away. On the more level ground I had some good speed and was still able to stay in the zone. The course was a one mile loop, I was doing twice. Of course my heart rate was going to go down a little on the descend, but I pushed hard and ran downhill faster to keep it up. Hitting the uphill I had to look down at my watch a few times because it kept warning me to slow down. I had my heart rate into Zone 5.  Pulled back a little on the speed but never fell out of my Zone 4.  Finished one of my fastest back to back miles in 10 minutes each.  I typically average a 12 minute mile as of late with a lot focus on the long steady distance, so not to go all out and blow up fast. 

I am very excited about my accomplishment and my lungs and breathing have never felt better. 

Looking back, could have I pushed myself to be faster, maybe so, but I wanted to stick in the Zone 4 and see where that would put me. 

Looking forward to a good weekend of cycling and running, hoping to get some trail miles in on Sunday. 

STRYD Running Power Meter

The STRYD running power based training system for runners. 
Find out how much power in watts you are creating while running. The footpod easily charges with the charging station you place the pod onto. I have been told you should only need to charge the pod once a month. This can differ though. Synch it with your smartphone and the STRYD app.

The center of the pod turns orange as is sits on top of the charging device. 

  I have the app on my smartphone, synched with BLE, and there it tracks my watts, time, average mile pace, incline, distance and steps per minute. I also have the STRYD footpad synched with my Suunto Ambit 2S. The initial set up, I had to pair the ANT+ device to the watch. In the fields also I activated the FOOTPOD and POWERPOD.  One of the screens I have it rotate through, I have the power in watts show up, so I know up the the second the power I am putting out while running. The STRYD power pod attaches and is worn on the shoe laces. 

In my training I use the STRYD Power Pod to let me know the effort being applied to my running / workouts.  

When connected to the STRYD Power Center you can analyze numerous aspects of your run and the data the pod collected. 

Statistics that appear in the Power Center after a workout wearing the STRYD Running Power Meter.

Leg Spring and Form Power, both of these I need to work on to get more efficient. 

Connects with Garmin, Suunto, Training Peaks, Strava, and 2Peak programs. 

Showing it here connecting to my Suunto account. 

To help increase my running efficiency I am looking at improving my leg spring stiffness, less energy to propel me forward.  In the case of the STRYD Power Pod meter the higher the number the better. (Yes, I need to work on this a ton.)  Also form power goes hand in hand with this. Lowering my form power number is what I aim to do also. The lower the number the better. 

Power meters are used in and have been used cycling and they are too used in running with STRYD. 

I am looking to do the Critical Power Test from the www.stryd.com/powercenter in the next week.