Like many runners I'm kind of obsessive compulsive (in a good way, right?) about logging how many days I've run and my mileage ("kilometrage" doesn't roll off the tongue), and most years getting out the door 350 plus days a year.
In the past I've taken this to the ridiculous-in-retrospect extent of hobble-shuffling through the few days after a marathon, in one case motivated by the perverse desire to run a year straight without a day off (having now achieved that once I have no desire to better it ever). This year I decided to take a week off for the mental and physical recuperation I needed. It was surprisingly mentally easy.
On 4 of the days "off" running I went to the pool and ran in the water with the funky belt on. The aqua running made my legs feel much better, and in fact scientific research shows that recovery from muscle trauma is better when you aqua run, than when you land run. Apparently it's also true from multiple studies that the aqua running can maintain your fitness for six weeks. This isn't one of those crazy "How many running miles does my long bike ride count for?" questions you see on letsruminate. I was really running. If it wasn't for the beautiful crisp fall weather waiting outside and the inconvenience of getting to the pool and the boredom and the chlorine in my hair I'd keep doing the pool running ... Really, it's that fun bobbing up and down in the pool and going nowhere while the lap swimmers wonder what you're doing.
So if the pool running is physiologically as good as running, here's my existential dilemma: Do I count the days I ran in the pool as days I ran? Do I divide by 5(8) and tally up the kilometres(miles) and add them to the year's total? What if those pool miles were the difference between getting to 4000 miles for the year and not?
Posted by eroberts at November 1, 2006 07:51 AM | TrackBackJust count hours and include it all. Half-joking there. The only reason I never counted pool running toward mileage is that it is very difficult to get the heart rate up to levels similar to land running. Even a hard pool run comes in at heart rates more like a recovery run on land.
I'll have to read those studies you linked to. I had two pool running stints of ten days each, and I found that I came out of them feeling like I had lost some fitness, but a week or so later found that I was running at faster speeds for the same heart rate. More like a taper, I guess.
Posted by: Eric at November 4, 2006 08:13 AM