Get started with the Polar Running Program
The only thing you need to create a Polar Running program is a Polar account. Before creating a program, make sure all of your personal and physical information is correct in your Flow Settings. Also, when answering the physical activity level questions, make sure they reflect your true condition as these will determine what kind of program you’ll get.
To create a program:
- Log into the Flow web service at www.polar.com/flow
- Choose Programs from the Tab.
- Choose your event, name it, set the event date, and when you wish to start the program.
- Fill in the physical activity level questions.*
- Choose if you want to include supporting exercises in the program.
- Read and fill in the Physical activity readiness questionnaire.
- Review your program, and adjust any settings if necessary.
- When you’re done, choose Start program.
*If four weeks of training history is available, these will be pre-filled.
A. Event: Choose 5k, 10k, half marathon or marathon. Your event will determine the minimum duration for your program.
B. Schedule: Name your program, set the date of your event, and set when you want to start it. You can start today!
C. Physical activity level: How active you are. It’s based on your activity from the previous three months. This will be pre-filled if you have at least four weeks of training history is available in Polar Flow. You can change the selections if you feel they don’t reflect your current condition.
Program preview
In the program preview you’ll see an overview of your running program. Have a look at the program to get a feel of it, and make changes to any selections if needed. At this stage you can still edit any settings - the program will then adapt, and you can view the changes immediately.
D. Training week: Choose a week from the slider to view a more detailed breakdown of it.
E. Week totals: Shows your total running training session duration for the chosen week.
F. Session schedule: View the sessions scheduled for that week. Shows all of your sessions –running, mobility, strength and stretching sessions. Click a session to see the details.
G. Rest days: Tick the box on any day to set it as a rest day. Depending on your program you can set one or more days to be rest days each week. At this point you can only set a certain day off every week but once you’ve created the program you can drag and drop individual training sessions from one day to another allowing you to fully customize each training week to fit your schedule.
The program can be performed with select Flow compatible Polar devices. The only requirement is that you have heart rate measurement during training. Depending on your device, there’s a few different ways to perform a running training session.
Grit X/Pacer/Vantage
Before starting a session, make sure you’ve synced your training session target to your device. The sessions are synced to your device as training targets.
To start a training target scheduled for the current day:
- Enter the pre-training mode by pressing and holding OK in time view.
- You'll be prompted to start a training target you've scheduled for the day.
- Press OK to view the target information.
- Press OK to return to pre-training mode, and choose the sport profile you want to use.
- When the watch has found all the signals, press OK. Recording started is displayed and you can start training.
Unite/Ignite
Before starting a session, make sure you’ve synced your training session target to your device. The sessions are synced to your device as training targets.
To start a training target scheduled for the current day:
Enter the pre-training mode by pressing the BACK button and tapping on Start training.
You'll be prompted to start a training target you've scheduled for the day.
Tap
to view the target information.Tap Start to return to pre-training mode.
When the watch has found all the signals, tap the display. Recording started is displayed and you can start training.
M400 and M430
Before starting a session, make sure you’ve synced your training session target to your device. The sessions are synced to your device as training targets, and you start them from your Diary. Follow guidance on your device throughout your session.
- On your M400/M430, go to Diary.
- Choose a day to view the scheduled target.
- Choose the target, and then choose the sport profile.
- Press START, and follow the guidance.
If you want to do a target scheduled for another day, you can – just choose a day from your M400/M430 Diary, and start the session scheduled for that day.
After training, sync your device with Flow to see the details of your session.
M200
Your running target for the current day appears at the top of the list under Training on your M200.
- Press and hold the RIGHT button to choose the running target. If you have a phased training target planned for the day, you can press the RIGHT button to browse through the different phases of the planned running session.
- Press and hold the RIGHT button to open the list of sport profiles.
- Browse through the sport profiles with the RIGHT button.
- Go outdoors and away from tall buildings and trees. Keep your M200 still with the display upwards to catch the GPS satellite signals. When the signal is found, the GPS icon stops blinking and stays on.
M200 has found your heart rate when your heart rate is shown. - Press and hold the RIGHT button to choose the sport profile you want to use and to start recording your running session.
When your program is ongoing, you can follow your progress from the Programs tab. You’ll see an overview of your current program, and how you’ve progressed.
A. Training week: Choose a week from the slider to view a more detailed breakdown of it.
B. Training week totals: Shows your total running training session duration for the chosen week.
C. Session schedule: View the sessions scheduled for that week. Shows all your sessions -running, mobility, stretching and strength sessions. Note that you can drag and drop any training session to another day in the same calendar week. This allows you to fully customize each training week to fit your schedule. Note that a session can only be moved to another day after the program has started. So if you've scheduled your program to start two weeks from now, you cannot move any sessions until the program start date. The target event can be moved within the same calendar week during the build-up or tapering phase. It cannot be moved during the base building phase. During the base building phase, you can only customize the currently ongoing four week set, as the program is updated every four weeks.
D. Training time in heart rate zones: Helps you stay on track with your weekly targets. Check how much time you’ve accumulated in each zone compared to your target for that week.
E. Event prediction: The event predictor estimates in what range your finish time for the event could be. It’s based on your Running Index score calculated from your running program training sessions.
F. Weekly Awards: You’ll receive feedback based on how well you’ve followed the program each week, and the number of stars you get will let you know exactly how good you did. Check the info below to see what is needed for each number of stars, or why you didn’t get any stars some week.
- 1 Star: On average, you’ve met 75% of your target in each heart rate zone
- 2 Stars: On average, you’ve met 90 % of your target in each heart rate zone
- 3 Stars: On average, you’ve met 100 % of your target in each heart rate zone
- No stars if you’ve trained too much (more than 200%) in the moderate zone (3)
- No stars if you’ve trained too much (more than 150%) in high intensity training zones (4 and 5)
Program update
After four weeks of base building, it’s time to update the program. The program will give you a suggestion on how to continue based on your performance. These are: proceed to the next level, continue at the same level or go down a level. Note that if you haven’t quite reached your goals, and the program suggests you to go back a level, you cannot choose to go up a level. If you’ve progressed well, and reached your goals, and the program suggests you to proceed to the next level, you cannot go back a level. When you’ve decided how to proceed with the program, choose continue.
When training for 5K or 10K events: If your program is shorter than 9 weeks, there will be no base building period, and you won’t be asked to update the program at any point. If your program is 13 weeks or less, you’ll just have one four-week base building period.
When training for half marathon or marathon events: If your program is shorter than 15 weeks, there will be no base building period, and you won’t be asked to update the program at any point.
A. Feedback: Feedback based on how well you’ve followed the program during the previous weeks. This is what your suggested program is based on.
B. Current program and suggested program: Compare your current program with the one suggested for you.
C. Program update: Tick the program update box if you want the program to automatically update your base building level.
Read more about the Polar Running Program.