Getting to 3
I have sweat (sweated?) more in the past three days than I have since I can remember! Doc said walking 3 mph at 10 degrees incline vs. 2 mph at 15 degrees would be good too. So this morning, I decided to see if I could make it at 3 mph.
Pleasantly surprised to note plenty of treadmills still available at the gym at 7:30 am; yay! Decided to do my PT stretches before the first 10 minutes of tread. Also looked up heart rate on the Internet this am. Looks like for my age (55 this year), I should shoot for 140-150 to get a good cardio workout but stay below 160-165.
My resting heart rate before I started walking was 104. Started slowly at 2.5 mph and 10 degrees incline. Over the course of the 10 minutes, I tried to bump it up 0.1 mph at a time. Per Doc, took 5 minutes off between sets instead of only 2 minutes.
By the 4th and last set of 10 minutes, I was getting up to 3 mph but my heart rate was up to 160 then too. In fact, my face was still red 20 minutes after I got home. Maybe not a good thing?
So, tonight I'm hoping to go back over there again and do some more sets, this time at 15 degrees from 2-2.5 mph. I figure if I do treadmill twice a day, I'll do one hour at 10 degrees and 2.5-3 mph and then the other hour at 15 degrees and 2-2.5 mph.
Tomorrow I have 2 walks planned instead: 1 hour in the morning (flat) and will do the stairs at Mt. Adams up to Immaculata after I'm done painting up there early evening. Maybe Lana or Glenda will join me.