Exercise with heart

I got a new toy last week, a Heart Rate Monitor. The positive spin on exercising with the HRM is that it shows me that I am, in fact, working hard, even if I'm not moving very fast (at all). The terrifying thing that it has shown me is how very little it takes to make my heart speed up. I wore it last Sunday at the Poplar Springs 5K and felt entirely justified walking up hills -- the HRM says I'm trying hard, really it does.

The theory espoused by many exercisey-types of people these days is that running around at a more moderate level of working hard helps build endurance, and eventually, you should be able to do more without your heart spazzing up to super speed. We'll see.

I decided to tabulate my lack of improvement from last year as I'm continue to recover from my winter-of-sloth:

Year	GW Parkway	Poplar Springs
2008	36:41	40:53
2009	38:44 *	41:08

* It was very hot, whine whine whine

I think I could've beaten last year's Poplar Springs time, but my heart told me it was trying pretty hard just to get that 41:08. And I'm certain I couldn't've beaten last years GW Parkway time, partially because this year it was unseasonably hot, and also because I just hadn't spent as much time running around this year.

Lake swim next weekend. Hopefully it will at least be warm on the day of the race. That won't help the water temperature, but it will make it feel nicer to dry off afterwards.