​Time to get your heart racing

The human heart plays a vital role when it comes to the intensity of exercise we aim for, whether it be a simple task of a slow walk or a high intensity bike session.

In short the heart is responsible for pumping oxygen rich blood all through our body to ensure we can function, let alone exercise. Our heart rate is the speed of the heartbeat measured by the number of contractions of the heart per minute (bpm).

There are many factors that affect the speed of a human’s heartbeat including:

-Exercise

-Age

-Gender

-Stress

-Sleep

-Eating and drinking

According to the NHS website “Most adults have a resting heart rate of 60-100 beats per minute (bpm). The fitter you are, the lower your resting heart rate is likely to be. For example, athletes may have a resting heart rate of 40-60 bpm or lower.” So now we have an idea of what a standard resting heart rate should be what is our maximum heart rate??? The most commonly used method to determine this is using the formula 220 minus your age, so in my case 220-33 = 187. As a guide this is ok, however this is not 100% accurate as some fitter individuals may be able to withstand higher heart rates than according to the calculation. 

Using these numbers individuals can work out their heart rate training zones, which helpful when looking to stay within a desired training intensity. Using the ‘National Academy Of Sports Medicine Cardio Respiratory Training for Performance Enhancement’ documentation as a reference point, the following heart rate training zones can be considered.

Zone 1: 65-75% of Heart Rate Max and is used for recovery, or lower intensity.

Zone 2: 80-85% of Heart Rate Max and is closer to the anaerobic threshold or higher intensity.

Zone 3: 86% – 95% of Heart Rate Max and is considered closer to peak training, which is just below heart rate max but above anaerobic threshold.

So in my case, using my max heart rate of 187, here are my personalised heart rate training zones.

Zone 1:

187 x 0.65 = 121.55

187 x 0.75 = 140.25

Zone 2:

187 x 0.80 = 149.6

187 x 0.85 = 158.95

Zone 3:

187 x 0.86 = 160.82

187 x 0.95 = 177.65

High Intensity Training vs Low Intensity Training 

Referring back to one of my previous blogs ‘Effective Fat Loss Training! Which is better, Cardio or Weight Training?’.

Here’s a breakdown of low intensity training vs High Intensity training.

Have you often heard the phrase, “slow and steady burns fat”?. A slow and steady
approach to cardio vascular training will require you to maintain an intensity of roughly 60% of your maximum heart rate for 30 minutes plus. At that point you will be in the fat burning zone and your body
will actively use fat as an energy source, as the intensity is low enough for your body not to require your fast energy(glycogen) as a fuel. The longer you maintain this intensity the more calories you
will burn, creating a larger calorie deficit for your day. This approach suits people who aren’t that keen to beast themselves with high intensity training, plus steady state cardio will allow you to recover faster post workout.

H.I.T Training or High Intensity Training approach to cardio vascular training tends to have more post workout benefits for fat loss. For example i put a client through a high intense interval based session whereby they had to perform 10 sets of 1 minute of pedalling as fast as they could on
the bike with a 1 minute recovery. After this period my client was visibly very fatigued, sweating, out of breath and heart rate elevation of over 80% during the intense periods. According to the bike, the calories burned was just 200. Research has shown the benefits to this approach is that the increased calorie burn continues after the workout and can actually increase your daily metabolic rate (speed at which you burn calories). This approach suits those who are have time constraints, as shorter time is required to achieve the same fat loss training target for that day
compared to steady state cardio.

Sources:

Wikipedia

NASM.org

Effective Fat Loss Training! Which is better, Cardio or Weight Training?