After taking yesterday and Saturday off, I walked with the trekking poles again this morning. The replacement tips arrived Sunday and so I had those on.
Three degrees F cooler this morning (74° v 77°), which often seems to have the effect of reducing the calorie expenditure somewhat. Thermal efficiency perhaps. Anyway, compared to Friday's first effort, it was roughly the same. 43s faster overall, 4s faster pace. 34 fewer calories (490 v. 524). 3bpm slower heart rate (135 v 138), again possibly due to the lower temperature and greater thermal efficiency.
As an aside, whenever I exercise in Florida, warmer temperatures correlate with higher heart rates and higher heart rates correlate with greater calories expended. I don't know if that's strictly an energy thing with regard extracting more useful energy from a cooler sink, or if it's a physiological cooling thing, with a higher heart rate to move more blood through the capillaries to shed heat through the skin at a faster rate, or if both of those are just aspects of the same thing.
I adjusted the straps, but it made no difference, I still had a death grip on the poles and trying to focus on relaxing them screwed everything else up.
The first walk had the worn tip with the metallic *tick* every time the pole landed. This morning, both poles had new tips but the left pole landed differently than the right one. More vibration and more noise. It has something to do with the way I'm using the pole in my non-dominant hand. At some point in mile three, I was able to get the left pole to land with the same sound and less vibration, but I couldn't sustain it. I'm sure it's a form issue and I'd probably be better off focusing on form rather than maintaining a vigorous pace, but I'm not that wise. Or patient.
We'll see how it goes tomorrow.
Originally posted at Nice Marmot 06:35 Monday, 29 July 2024