Any advice on bringing the pulse down?

[BFwillie_g]

Hey there,

Q: what do you do about a pulse that won't come down? I mean, other than be patient and take it slow and everything.... I know about that stuff.

I'm just wondering if anyone might have some specific tip, a kind of herb or therapy that may help? Something along those lines.

 

[NickW]

For me Willie, I have found that only doing low intensity runs keeping my hr down actually makes me worse as far as pace. I can literally watch it from week to week get slower and slower, even though I'm running at the same hr. The last couple weeks I switched back to doing varying levels of intensity, 1 low, 1 high, and 1 just kind of mediumish. I am shocked at the results I am achieving. My long slow runs my pace has gone up tremendously while my hr has gone down. For me, varying my runs instead of doing runs that are all at the same hr really has made a huge difference. I can't believe the results I am seeing. Hope this helps as for me this really helps and works.

 

[Barefoot Dama]

Willie, my advice is to stop whatever you're doing that is making your heart rate to go up.

 

[BFwillie_g]

Thanks Nick - my problem is that I overtrained a few years ago and am still susceptible to the affects. It's very frustrating. The Maffetone lowHR stuff allows me to run, but now I want to ramp up the intensity and duration in prepping for my May ultra. I feel that my pulse rises to high on what are really not hard paces for me, and it stays up too long. And interrupts my sleep. I need two days to recover after a moderately quick, hard run. So, although yuor advice is spot-on for most people, and was how I used to run and had had a resting HR of 40, it just doesn't work for me anymore.

Dama - thank you also and of course you're right, I know that. But... well, I'm working on this. If someone else were to ask the question, I'd have about a dozen tips for them, lol. Hell, I'm a Qigong instructor, a good meditator, practice deep stomach breathing ... I also drink herbal tea with Valerian Root tincture (stinky stuff, so you know it's good!) which helps quite a bit. But I just can't seem to put this episode behind me and reset my biological clock, so to speak

 

[NickW]

What do you mean overtrained Willie? I was doing the Maffetone stuff for a few months and watched my pace drop every week with a sinking heart. My distances definitely got longer though, almost doubled. I wonder if one should maybe do a few months Maf, then do a few months training like I do now, and then repeat the cycle? I truly believe that you do need to train both aerobic and anaerobically as our bodies are designed to do both.

 

[BFwillie_g]

Hey Nick - in 2008, I reached that dangerous zone where I was running ~50mpw and getting faster. I deluded myself into thinking that I was fitter than I was and started ramping up the training. I bought Pfitzinger's "Advanced Marathoning" and stuck to the 55mpw once through (at paces that were too high for me at that point and I was already feeling the effects but was in denial). And then did the 70mpw plan right after, but extended the long runs and was doing closer to 80mpw.

The high mileage wasn't the problem in itself, though. Pfitzinger's plans include a lot of "quality" work - mile repeats, intervals, etc., higher-paced stuff which sends the pulse (in a non-advanced, less-fit runner who thinks he's superman) soaring. And not enough recovery time (for me).

So, I was running when I should have been recovering. And not only running, I was running hard. And getting faster, for sure. My HM time dropped to 1:29 and was shooting for a 3:12 marathon - ridiculous numbers for someone like me!

Anyway, that's what I did. And it got to the point where I couldn't even stand up from the couch without my HR jumping into race mode. I basically stopped sleeping nights and just crashed at random times during the day. I didn't have a resting pulse anymore becuase I never actually rested. That's overtraining. It sounds like such a timid condition that you just have to take a little time off to set right, but you actually re-program your sympathetic vegetative nervous system (in English it's the autonomic nervous system), you end up in permanent "survival mode", what the metabolism does when the cave bear is after you - doesn't let you rest. Ever. Till you die.

You end up depressed/bi-polar, and just generally unhappy with everything. Some people contract serious diseases like pneumonia when they're overtrained. I just felt all tensed-up, luckily.

And I'm fine now, generally healthy as can be. Except my resting pulse hovers around the 55 mark and I feel the effects of any higher-pulse workouts for a few days. And I'd just like to get back to 'normal'

(sorry for writing the first chapter of a book, but you asked lol)

 

[Barefoot Dama]

Wow Willie, that was surely overtraining for sure glad to hear you're better now.
This is what happens to me when I take a long break from running, my RHR is ussualy 42/43 bpm but after the break time it goes up just the same as yours.
The thing the brings it back to the 40's is running my long runs slow. I mean very slow like 3/4 mins slower than your comfortable mile.
My comfortable mile is 8 mm so I run my slow long runs at 11/12 mm for a month or two and that takes care of the RHR.
Hope that helps.

 

[NickW]

Wow Willie, I had heard of over training but I never really knew what it was. I assumed maybe it was something like when you do tmts and you ended up with a stress fracture or some other ailment. So, on the hr thing, when you over trained, was your hr dropping or raising? I'm just curious because when I was in the Army we pushed our bodies way past our limits and I learned to be "comfortable" at extremely high intensity tasks for long periods of time. Anyhow, the last year I have had a heck of a time trying to retrain my hr into being low. I did the Seattle to Portland (204 miles) bicycle race in one day a few years back with my hr in the 180's just about the whole time and felt fine. It's weird, but as long as I've been keeping track of my hr it's been really high compared to my friends who do the same activity as me. In any case now I am wondering if it could be from over training while in the Army.

 

[SillyC]

Willie, have you been to the doctor for a complete top-to-bottom physical? I'd suggest this, and bring up the heart rate issues. See what your doctor says. On one hand, it might be hard to get a doctor to take a 55 bpm heart rate seriously, but on the other hand, it IS elevated over what it was just a couple of years ago, and it seems as though you are probably just as fit.

I'm worried if rather than overtraining, you're nursing the early stages of something more serious. Hopefully not, but it would suck to find out the hard way after having a warning sign for years.

 

[migangelo]

this overtraining is making some sense to me. i used to run faster and take naps all the time. just about everyday. i have been doing maf for a few months and have just noticed a drop in my times. i also have more energy and am not having to nap everyday. hmm, i just did some body weight exercises and my sleep pattern is messed up again so that i've been napping these past few days. i wonder if that means i'm working out too hard? crap. figuring out this stuff is hard.

 

[NickW]

Mike, if I remember correctly Maf says you shouldn't do weights.... They put too much stress on your body. That part of Maf I kind of call bull on. Our ancestors surely did have to do things that would shoot the hr up, even if briefly and they sure as hell would have to sprint occasionally. I still believe in the train your whole body, not just part of it.

 

[BFwillie_g]

hey there - glad to have triggered a conversation, only got a few seconds for a note to SillyC - I had a physical a couple weeks ago and told the doc all about it. He did an EGK and also a stress EGK and everything's top, according to his parameters. I was the fittest person they'd ever had on their bicycle. I also had my cortisol and pretty much every blood parameter checked - everything tops, perfect.

It isn't something else, I can guarantee that. It's just just the leftovers of a really stupid thing I did a few years ago.

fwiw, ran about 90min today, very slow, monitored HR, avg'd 133, peaked 172 on one fairly large hill that I decided to just storm up to the top of, and have been monitoring pulse since then. RHR is 59 right now. So, recovery is happening... thanks!

Also, I'm being smart, running 3x a week, plenty of rest/recovery - but Sundays are gonna start getting tough, that's just the way it is

 

[SillyC]

That's really good to hear, willie!

 

[jldeleon]

For me Willie, I have found that only doing low intensity runs keeping my hr down actually makes me worse as far as pace. I can literally watch it from week to week get slower and slower, even though I'm running at the same hr. The last couple weeks I switched back to doing varying levels of intensity, 1 low, 1 high, and 1 just kind of mediumish. I am shocked at the results I am achieving. My long slow runs my pace has gone up tremendously while my hr has gone down. For me, varying my runs instead of doing runs that are all at the same hr really has made a huge difference. I can't believe the results I am seeing. Hope this helps as for me this really helps and works.

I used to run this way. I found it was a more efficient way of burning fat, too. I guess I kind-of run that way now. My hr is a 20 beat difference between my high intensity runs vs. low intensity, BUT, I only do one high-intensity run a week -the intensity of which is getting lower and lower thanks to running with SOMEONE who is doing the Maffetone training. I really should make a conscious effort to vary it more. Of course my work schedule is not always conducive to that, but oh well.

 

[jldeleon]

this overtraining is making some sense to me. i used to run faster and take naps all the time. just about everyday. i have been doing maf for a few months and have just noticed a drop in my times. i also have more energy and am not having to nap everyday. hmm, i just did some body weight exercises and my sleep pattern is messed up again so that i've been napping these past few days. i wonder if that means i'm working out too hard? crap. figuring out this stuff is hard.

How much of a drop??? So, you are just napping every other day? That extra napping is most likely from your excessive tooth pain. Why would it be from weight exercises? Or are you doing like 3 hours of weight lifting a day?

 

[jldeleon]

Mike, if I remember correctly Maf says you shouldn't do weights.... They put too much stress on your body. That part of Maf I kind of call bull on. Our ancestors surely did have to do things that would shoot the hr up, even if briefly and they sure as hell would have to sprint occasionally. I still believe in the train your whole body, not just part of it.

I think that evolutionarily, we are meant to do about 80% aerobic, 10% cardio, and 10% heavy weights with few reps for men/10% low weights high reps for women. I base this on hunting and gathering movements. Long endurance runs with regard to hunting, with sprinting, etc., at the end as well as flinging/dragging heavy stuff around. And chicks need more long twitch muscles for repetitive movements done in gathering berries and basket weaving and putting on make-up and stuff. And I do think that all these different types of physical activity should be at random since they were at random back in the day.

 

[BFwillie_g]

Wow Willie, I had heard of over training but I never really knew what it was. ... the last year I have had a heck of a time trying to retrain my hr into being low. ... It's weird, but as long as I've been keeping track of my hr it's been really high compared to my friends who do the same activity as me. In any case now I am wondering if it could be from over training while in the Army.

Yo Nick! Yeah, "Overtraining" sounds pretty benign when in reality it's one of the worst scenarios a runner can get him/herself caught up in. It should have a fancy-pants, scary name and acronym like "Collapse of the Sympathetic Autonomic Nervous System", call it C-SANS for short, and then people would take notice. That would be good because a lot of runners play around with this without realizing what they're risking.

With you, I can't really say at all but it seems pretty likely, from what you wrote here and in a couple other places, that you run and exercise at a too-high intensity level and/or don't take enough time to recover. I think your experience in the military could certainly trigger it, and much more! The psychological baggage you carry around could possibly play an even bigger role than your running/biking, etc. (just a thought, not an analysis).

 

[BFwillie_g]

.... hmm, i just did some body weight exercises and my sleep pattern is messed up again so that i've been napping these past few days. i wonder if that means i'm working out too hard? crap. figuring out this stuff is hard.

bolded for emphasis, lol. Yeah, Mike, it's a genuine beeyatch and takes a lot of discipline to sort out. Again, based on your description, it really does sound like you're 'in the loop', too. But I mean that conversationally, just my feeling and reaction to your comments.