I looked at the soles of my shoes before heading out. I think I need new shoes. Time to read a billion reviews, then buy something on sale and regret it later!
This was an odd and unsatisfying run. My goal was to run at a pace of 150 BPM, so I expected a slower time. My first km, during which I did my best not to run fast at all, came in at 5:35/km, which is pretty zippy. Annoyingly, the Apple Watch did not show my heart rate during this first km, a problem that seems to be happening more often lately (possibly a bug with the watchOS 9 update?). It didn’t silently record it, either–there is no data in the summary of the run. As I started the second km, I could see the heart symbol spinning, trying to determine heart rate, but it was still getting nothing. I was pretty sure my heart was still beating.
I then paused the workout and opened the heart rate app. This app does a single thing: it shows your heart rate (weird, I know). After a few moments, it said my BPM was 148, which seemed about right. I then went back to the workout app and sure enough, this managed to get the heart rate showing in my workout. I resumed running.
Then something strange happened. Even though I was maintaining a moderate pace, my BPM kept going up. It went from 148 to 151 to 158, then 161 and at this point I started mildly freaking out, because there is no way my heart should have suddenly started beating that much harder. I slowed my pace even more and eventually saw the BPM drop down to around 153 and settle. I have no idea if this was actually happening (as it’s never happened before, that I’ve noticed) or if the watch was just glitching out. You can see the spike here:
It was also much windier than normal so for the first half of the run, I was running into the wind, which slowed me down a little. Temperature and humidity were fine–21C and 46%–and there was only a modest increase in sweating. But I did feel kind of blah. There were also more people on the trail than expected for the middle of the week, though it is admittedly a gorgeous day for the last day of summer.
I suppose I can’t complain too much. I did finish with a pace under 6:00/km despite things. Friday is looking cooler and a bit soggy, which is perhaps appropriate for the first run of fall. We’ll see how it goes.
Stats:
Run 717 Average pace: 5:58/km Location: Burnaby Lake (CW) Start: 11451 a.m. Distance: 10.03 km Time: 59:55 Weather: Sunny Temp: 21ºC Humidity: 46% Wind: moderate BPM: 152 Weight: 160.3 Total distance to date: 5272 km Devices: Apple Watch Series 5, iPhone 12, AirPods (3rd generation) Shoes: Brooks Caldera 5 (380 km)