{"id":17303,"date":"2013-03-26T19:33:21","date_gmt":"2013-03-26T23:33:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/?p=17303"},"modified":"2020-12-31T08:44:35","modified_gmt":"2020-12-31T13:44:35","slug":"heart-rate-testing-confuses-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/2013\/03\/26\/heart-rate-testing-confuses-me\/","title":{"rendered":"Heart Rate Testing Confuses Me"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I’m following the LW Coaching 100 Mile Mountain Bike Race \u2013 Finisher Plan<\/a> again this year, again in hopes that it’ll get me ready to complete the Lumberjack 100<\/a> race in June. Part of this involves testing my Lactate Threshold Heart Rate, or basically, my average heart rate over 20 minutes of riding my bike as hard as I can. This average is then run through a formula (one of many — I’m using this one from LW Coaching<\/a>) to determine heart rate zones. When working out (really, just riding my bike) I then try to stay in the prescribed zone for the listed amount of time, with the idea that this helps build endurance at that zone.<\/p>\n

For example, the zones that were calculated for me off of today’s test with an average heart rate (HR) of 170 BPM during the test are as follows:<\/p>\n

Zone 1 – Recovery: 111 – 137 BPM
\nZone 2 – Aerobic: 138 – 152 BPM
\nZone 3 – Tempo: 153 – 159 BPM
\nZone 4 – Sub Threshold: 160 – 169 BPM
\nZone 5 – Super Threshold: 170 – 180 BPM<\/p>\n

Much of the planned riding in preparation for finishing a 100 mile race involves hours of riding in zones 2 or 3, which seems easy at first, but gets difficult as the hours progress. It does seem to work, though, as it helped me get up to riding 8+ hours comfortably, as long as I was capable of pacing myself. Hopefully this’ll continue to help this year, and I won’t quit early like I did last year<\/a>. I’d really like to finish this race at least once.<\/p>\n

Last year I first performed this test on the trainer on the second day of the plan, but ended up with a low-seeming heart rate of 153 BPM. I tried again on April 4th, 2012 and got a result of 166 BPM\u2020, which is what I’ve used for my HR zones for training last year. This current result of 170 BPM has pushed the zones up a bit from last year, and I hope this helps push me a bit more.<\/p>\n

Despite using the same route as last year for the test and following a similar warmup I can’t help but question the variances in numbers. Today was much colder than last year (42.3\u00b0F vs. 59.7\u00b0F), the bike used had slightly knobbier tires and a suspension fork, and there was a lot more wind today. Maybe the harder conditions and higher average HR mean I’ve become a capable of a little bit more over the last year? I’m not really sure.<\/p>\n

The more I read about HR zones and LTHR calculation the more confused I become. I was pushing myself as hard as I felt I could go without failing, so with Joe Friel<\/a>‘s (a pretty well regarded coach) simple adage…<\/p>\n

Do not be concerned with anything other than are you going as hard as you can go right now. If the answer is “yes” then you are doing the test right.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

…maybe I am doing it right.<\/p>\n

\u2020 This was then recalculated on May 8th, 2012, but likely due to a loose HRM strap I ended up with a maximum of 225 BPM and an average of 187 BPM, clearly erroneous numbers. As a result I just stuck with the previous number of 166 BPM from April.<\/p>\n

Update on May 8, 2013:<\/strong> Yesterday, as prescribed, I performed another LTHR test. Riding the same route (but with a different warmup) in 35\u00b0F warmer weather (79\u00b0F vs 34\u00b0F) my average HR was 2 BPM faster and average speed was 1.5 MPH faster. I think it may have been a bit less windy, which likely explains the higher average speed.<\/p>\n

This pushes each of the zones up slightly to the following, which is what I’ll likely use for the remainder of the training plan:<\/p>\n

Zone 1 – Recovery: 112 – 138 BPM
\nZone 2 – Aerobic: 139 – 154 BPM
\nZone 3 – Tempo: 155 – 161 BPM
\nZone 4 – Sub Threshold: 162 – 171 BPM
\nZone 5 – Super Threshold: 172 – 182 BPM<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m following the LW Coaching 100 Mile Mountain Bike Race \u2013 Finisher Plan again this year, again in hopes that it’ll get me ready to complete…<\/p>\n

Continue readingHeart Rate Testing Confuses Me<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cycling","category-health","entry"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17303"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17303\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19322,"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17303\/revisions\/19322"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nuxx.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}