About two years ago, I saw an ad for a pink Polar heart rate monitor and decided I had to have it. My husband bought it for a Valentine’s Day gift and I first used it around the 4th of July. When I calculated the calories burned after 30 minutes on the treadmill, I decided it must be broken. After all, the screen on the treadmill said I had burned over 350 calories in that time; the monitor read 176. So, for about another year, the monitor and strap lived comfortably in my gym bag.
I finally used it again last fall, when I wasn’t really seeing any results from the long stretches on the cardio machines and aerobic classes. “You can burn over 400 calories in this class!” “You’ll burn at least another 600-800 calories in the hours after an intense weight workout!’ were the claims. Well, I wanted to see for myself
The American College of Sports Medicine recommends that for optimum heart health, heart rates be monitored during all exercise in order to determine the appropriate amount of exertion for each individual. A heart rate monitor can help make individual activities more effective and time efficient, safer and much more fun. It’s not just for structured exercise either and it can help turn any activity into a workout. Since it serves the purpose of measuring and recording your heart rate, while giving you instant feedback about the work level of your heart, it is one of the most effective ways to track your progress. You can see chart the improvement in your aerobic endurance and accurately calculate how many calories you burn during a workout.
In simple terms, you can calculate your training zone from two numbers: your maximum heart rate (MHR), which is the fastest rate your heart is able to beat per minute, and your resting heart rate (RHR), the rate at which your heart beats when you are completely at rest. Calculate your zone by clicking on the links below:
http://www.marathonguide.com/FitnessCalcs/heartrate1calc.cfm
http://www.marathonguide.com/FitnessCalcs/HeartRate2calc.cfm
You don’t have to be a professional athlete to benefit from wearing a heart rate monitor when you exercise. Whether you are working out to control weight, tone muscles, build endurance, strengthen your heart, relieve stress or simply maintain good health and fitness, a heart rate monitor can help you find the right pace and intensity of exercise to achieve your goals. We read all kinds of recommendations about how often and how intensely we should exercise, and a heart rate monitor can help us work at the right pace. Moderate intensity is about 50–70 percent of our maximum heart rate while vigorous intensity is about 70–85 percent of our maximum.
Since many of us have limited time for exercise, a heart rate monitor can help maximize our workout to achieve the best results. If we simply gauge our workout by time or by feel, we might not be elevating our heart rate enough to get cardiovascular and weight loss benefits. Monitoring our heart rate helps us set a pace without wasting time at a too-slow or too-fast level that defeats the purpose of our exercise.
If our heart rate is too low during exercise our body gets very little benefit. Consequently, we're not likely to see the results we want, like weight loss or increased endurance. If our heart rate is too high during exercise we may tire too quickly and become frustrated, or even risk injury. To lose weight, experts suggest exercising at a pace between 60-70 percent of our maximum heart rate for 30 minutes or more, with short intervals at higher intensity (up to 90 percent of your max heart rate). A heart rate monitor can tell you if you are exercising hard enough –– or too hard –– to burn stored fat.
For tips on what to look for in a heart rate monitor and how to buy the right heart rate monitor for you, click on the link below and read Part IV.
http://www.marathonguide.com/training/articles/HeartMonitorTraining.cfm
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