Tracking your heart rate(HR) when engaging in any form of exercise or training is the best way to ensure you’re working out effectively, safely and within your limits.

A Heart Rate Monitor is the best way to measure your heart rate effectively.  It is also a great tool for motivation as well as giving you more understanding about your own body.

When I work with clients, I ask that their first investment in themselves be a Heart Rate monitor so that we can become in tune with their body and how the exercises I’ve chosen for them are stimulating them.

No matter what you are training for; marathon, weight loss, body building, weight maintenance, a heart rate mornitor is the best tool to let you know if you are training properly for the desired end result.  One of the main goals of your workouts is to improve your cardiovascular fitness.   When you heart rate is measured
during exercise, it tells you how hard your heart is working to perform that given activity.  You become in tune with just how much an activity taxes your body.

Using Simply the fact that your breathing a little harder than normal as your gauge of exertion is very primitive, misleading, and “old school”.  Learning to read your heart rate serves as a motivational tool that allows you to objectively detect beneficial changes which you can’t otherwise see.  The benefits of monitoring your heart rate are:

• Safety – The heart rate is a gauge by which to assess the intensity of your workout to make sure you’re not overexerting or overextending yourself.  For example, if your heart rate is above your working heart rate range, it lets you know to back off a little.  Many even have alarms that you can set to warn you when you reach this determined maximum.

• Effectiveness – If your Heart Rate indicates you’re not working hard enough, then you can pick up the intensity  to maximize the effectiveness of your workout.  To receive the aerobic benefits from your workout, you need to stay in your working heart rate range for at least 20 to 30 minutes continuously.

• Motivation/Incentive -  By monitoring your heart rate from week to week as you participate in an aerobic activity, you’ll discover that you will be able to exercise at a higher level of intensity, but at the same or lower heart rate.  This is the way the heart tells you it is becoming stronger and more efficient. As the demand for oxygen in the muscles for a given activity decreases, the heart no longer needs to pump the oxygen carrying red blood cells in such a hurried frenzy.  When you see positive results, it will motivate you to strive for even better results.

Heart rates to track & Training Zones

It is important to know when to track your heart rate and the purpose of it:

Resting Heart Rate(RHR) -   The rate your heart is pumping when you have been sitting quietly for a while or when you are sleeping is your resting heart rate. This rate indicates your cardiovascular fitness level.   A person who is in good aerobic condition usually has a lower resting heart rate.  Having a high resting heart rate is a good sign that you are in bad shape.

Determining your resting heart rate (RHR) is very easy. You can do it manually or by wearing your monitor.  Find somewhere nice and quiet, sit down and relax. For the manual version, position yourself so that you can see a clock or watch without movement. After 5 to 10 minutes of relaxation, check your pulse for 60 seconds while watching the clock to determine your resting pulse rate (beats/min). The number of beats you get over that 1 minute period is your RHR.  If you are wearing a monitor, you can actually see your HR climb down as your body becomes more and more relaxed. Use the lowest number you see during that relaxation period as your RHR.

The heart is a muscle so with regular exercise it will become larger and become more efficient as a pump. As a result you will find your resting heart rate gets lower so you will need to check your RHR on a regular basis to gauge your progress.

Maximum Heart Rate(MHR) – This is one of the most important and easiest HR measurement to determine and track.  As a general rule of thumb, your maximum Heart Rate is 220 – Your Age.  So if
you’re 50 yrs old, your MHR is 220 – 50 = 170 BPM.  This is a ball park range for you to work with.  There are more scientific test such as a stress test to determine this since everyone’s maximum is different but this will work as a ball park figure.

As you get into better and better aerobic condition, your maxiumum heart rate may increase and you will notice you are more comfortable or can sustain a higher heart rate longer as you become more fit.

Working Heart Rate Ranges -  Heart rate training zones are calculated by taking into consideration your Maximum Heart Rate (MHR) and giving you a % range of your maximum as a gauge to know where you need to be for that particular zone.  Within each training zone, subtle physiological effects take place to enhance your fitness, fat loss and performance.

It is important to vary your workouts and plan to workout frequently in all of these zones so that you keep your body “on its toes” and using different nutrients as primary fuel.   Within the category of “working” heart rate, there are 4 main ranges to work in…

• The Low Intensity or Recovery Zone (60% to 70% of MHR) - Training within this zone develops basic endurance and aerobic capacity. All easy recovery training should be completed at a maximum of 70%. Another huge advantage of training in this zone is that at this low intensity, your body burns fat as its fuel source helping you to lose weight.  You will also be allowing your muscles to replenish with glycogen, which has been expended during those faster paced workouts.

• The Aerobic Zone (70% to 80% of MHR) – Training in this zone will develop your cardiovascular system. The body’s ability to transport oxygen to, and carbon dioxide away from, the working muscles can be developed and improved. That is the goal of this zone.  As you become fitter and stronger from training in this zone, you will find yourself able to perform long duration exercise at up to 75% of your MHR, Therfore getting the benefits of some fat burning and improved aerobic capacity.

• The Anaerobic Zone (80% to 90% of MHR) – Training in this zone will develop your lactic acid system. In this zone, your individual anaerobic threshold (AT) is found. During these heart rates, the amount of fat being utilized as the main source of energy is greatly reduced and glycogen stored in the muscle is predominantly used. One of the by-products of burning this glycogen is lactic acid. There is a point at which the body can no longer remove the lactic acid from the working muscles quickly enough to continue performing. This is your anaerobic threshold (AT). Through the correct training, it is possible to delay the AT by being able to increase your ability to deal with the lactic acid for a longer period of time or by pushing the AT higher.

• The Red Line Zone (90% to 100% of MHR) – Training in this zone will only be possible for short periods. It effectively trains your fast twitch muscle fibers and helps to develop strength and speed. This zone is reserved for interval sprinting and explosive plyometric training and only the very fit are able to train effectively within this zone.

Your Recovery Heart Rate

This is an important measure of your fitness as well.  How quickly does your heart rate climb back down from the elevated, stressed range where it has been during the workout.  With a HR monitor, you can watch as you cool down and stretch how quickly your HR comes back down to normal working BPM.

It’s good to monitor how long your HR takes to get back to under 100 BPM.  Once you are very fit, you may find your HR will get there within 1 or 2 minutes post workout.  When you’re not in such great shape, it may take over 10 minutes.

So no matter what your fitness level, It’s not only beneficial but extremely important to monitor your Heart Rate.  It can keep the very athletic and fit reaching new heights in their training and those who are just starting, from overdoing/under doing it and giving them some HR targets to shoot for. You can pick one up at a sporting goods store or you can order a heart rate monitor online.  I recommend the brand ‘Polar’.  I have always experienced excellent customer service in the very few occasions where I had a problem with my HR monitors.  They’ve really done a tremendous job to retain my business

I personally use the Polar F11 model as it has all sorts of bells and whistles that I use in my own training such as Calories burned (measured by your Age, height, weight, sex, and actual HR) and it also stores all your workout data for quick reference to keep you on track.  It sends you a little email every Monday letting you know your stats from the previous week so you know if you’ve been slacking

Working out with one of our personal trainers is also a great way to learn to use your monitor and be guided through the different Heart Rate Zones and get training ideas from a professional. Therefore, as a bonus, if you have been thinking about starting to work with one of our personal trainers and sign up for personal training during the month of February, you will receive not only $100 off! But also a Polar FS1 Heart Rate Monitor FREE to help you get on the right track with your fitness and weight loss.  Give us a call (1-888-872-7961) and mention”Heart Rate Email Offer”.  But that’s not all, here’s what else you’ll receive…

• A FREE Trial session with one of our Personal trainers (a $90 value)
• A Polar FS1 Heart Rate monitor (a $60 Value)
• A Fitness & Nutrition Journal to speed up your progress, get you eating right, making the lifestyle changes and staying accountable (a $20 value)
• An Achieve Fitness Tshirt (a $20 value)
• And $100 OFF!

That’s $290 in combined value – yours FREE when you sign up for 12 sessions or more before February 28th.

C’mon, make 2009 the year you finally did it!

To Your Health & Well-being

Dennys Passeto, CPT
Achieve Fitness
Home of the Top Personal Trainers in Virginia, Maryland and Washington DC

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