Training & Nutrition - what would cause my heart rate to max out my hr monitor (250bpm+)?

so, for the past couple of years ive had a "problem" that pops up maybe once a month (ie. not enough for me to even remember the last time it happened) where my heart just starts beating really fast for a short period of time. It happened today while working out and i just happened to be wearing my hr monitor. the hr monitor spiked to 250 (its limit) and then went down to 240, 230, 245ish and then hovered around there while my heart was beating like crazy. this went on for about 20-30 seconds until i could finally calm down my heart. Now this heart rate monitor is pretty accurate and ive never had problems with it. Ive never bothered checking into this problem with my heart since people just tell me its heart murmors which apparently just happen to some people. Since it rarely happens its never been a priority. Im going to make an apointment with my doctor this week but i just want to know if my heart could actually have hit 250bpm+ and what the problem might be. I know my heart rate speeds up like crazy because its almost impossible for me to manually count it and it feels alot faster that 170-190bpm.

My first guess would be signal interference. Are you actualy feeling your HR manually when this happens?

If so, then seeing a doctor is definetly a good idea

As a medic, I have only seen a handful of people with 250 HR's. If you are actually palpating the pulse at the wrist and getting readings of 200+, you shoudl probably see a doctor. During hard workouts at age 23, it wouldn't be too much of a concern to see 200-205bpm. 210 and above, if not caused by interference, is too high.

What happens to the time when the BPM goes crazy? Do you lose like 8 minutes? Like it's 2:30 before the fritz and then it shows 2:38 after the fritz???

. . . the hr monitor spiked to 250 (its limit) and then went down to 240, 230, 245ish and then hovered around there while my heart was beating like crazy. this went on for about 20-30 seconds until i could finally calm down my heart. . . . people just tell me its heart murmors which apparently just happen to some people. Since it rarely happens its never been a priority. Im going to make an apointment with my doctor this week but i just want to know if my heart could actually have hit 250bpm+ and what the problem might be. I know my heart rate speeds up like crazy because its almost impossible for me to manually count it and it feels alot faster that 170-190bpm.

Unless you heard it from you doctor after a full heart work-up (ekg, stress test and whatever) is doesn't sound like "just heart murmurs"--especially if it is going on for half a minute or so.

Dude, see a doctor ASAP. Just because it happens just once in a while, doesn't mean it is ok. You don't want to be fooling around with heart stuff. Make sure you tell the doc EXACTLY what you are doing when this happens (even though it may happen rarely). Tell him exactly how you feel when it is happening--remember there are many descriptive words to do so.

Get to a doc. It could be nothing, but you don't know, do you?

Friend of mine has a three year old with SVT, supraventricular tachychardia. The symptoms are like you describe above.

You must have the dial stuck at 400 watts all the time. I'm reporting you to the admins. You must have hijacked R600DuraAce's account. That's nothing to mess around with dood!

On the serious side...I'd go see a doctor just to be sure...this is nothing to mess around with.

Sounds like some sort of arritmia or tachycardia... definetely go see a doctor. Prefferably a cardiologist.

Ricardo

As a medic, I have only seen a handful of people with 250 HR's. If you are actually palpating the pulse at the wrist and getting readings of 200+, you shoudl probably see a doctor. During hard workouts at age 23, it wouldn't be too much of a concern to see 200-205bpm. 210 and above, if not caused by interference, is too high.

I didnt have a chance to really to count my pulse over a long period since it was over pretty quick and i spent the whole time staring at my hr monitor. My heart was beating so fast though i didnt really need to check my pulse since i could feel it through my chest. At first i thought it might be the hr monitor malfunctioning but my hr varried and moved around while i could feel my heart change speeds. I consider myself pretty healthy, i mountain bike alot, run, workout, hike, etc and when i go jogging/biking with friends they usually cant keep up. I will make an apointment with a doctor this week.

i was wearing my mp3 player but that didnt interfere with the rest of my workout and run. could just the combination of my heart speeding up and the mp3 player confused the heart rate monitor?

I often see way wack numbers near electrical lines or similar, such as traffic signal loop detectors and such. I have heard, but not confirmed, that some wireless computer networking equipment can cause similar interference, too. So if you happened to be in an area with that kind of stuff it could trigger it. If you remember where it was, you could try going back there and see if it goes crazy again. I have a few places where it is highly repeatable; just have to ignore the numbers for that time as I know there's nothing physically wrong with me.

Some kinds of arrythmia can cause HRMs to read incorrectly as well. The HRM relies on a certain electrical pattern and the arrythmia doesn't conform to the pattern so it causes an incorrect reading. The heart condition is not necessarily harmful, but of course you should listen to your doctor on that and not a bunch of internet weenies.

but i just want to know if my heart could actually have hit 250bpm+ and what the problem might be.Your heart has four chambers, they usually "beat" [contract] two at a time.

Your heart can't actually beat much over 220. Your monitor is recording the muscle "beat signals" going too fast, but usually the other chambers cannot keep up or respond the signal so blood flow is not increased. It's not a good thing.


and what the problem might be.The problem is often somewhat of a mystery. Sometimes it's related to the electrical chemistry of the heart tissue. Sometimes, the tissue becomes damaged or for some reason "blocks" the signal. Go search on "heart diesease sinus problems"........

I consider myself pretty healthy, i mountain bike alot, run, workout, hike, etc and when i go jogging/biking with friends they usually cant keep up. I will make an apointment with a doctor this week.

A relative of mine who was EXTREMELY fit had a stroke because of a problem that would not be detectable until it failed with his heart. A year later, he's still not anywhere close to pre-stroke condition. When it comes to the cardiac system, I'll never take a chance when something feels weird. If there's a predictor, I wouldn't want to say "I should have...."

Thats really worrying mate. Assuming it isn't a defect with the HRM (i.e. your heart rate isn't going that high at all), i agree with what everyone says here. Don't waste your time looking for causes on the internet or in books. Go and see a cardiologist straight away, it's not worth taking the risk with your health.

update: i went to my doctor this morning and he did some tests etc and sent me to a cardiologist. He also sent me to get some bloodwork done. Hes trying to cover all the bases which is good. After that i go back to him on tuesday and hes going to do a full checkup to make sure everything else is working. I know caffiene affects me quite a bit so i have to cut it out for a week as well. Ive been trying to ween myself onto it for a while now (perks me up for 5am workouts/work :) ) and that might be whats affecting me as well. Best of all is i dont have to pay for any of this. I love canadian health care :)

Good to hear you're getting things sorted. Let us know how it goes.

okay, i had all my tests done - the full works. Blood work, xrays etc. My heart is really strong, there are no abnormal beats, resting heart rate is awesome, blood is great (good amount of iron), and the best of all my doctor said my cholesterol level is incredible even for my age. It looks like the problem was caffeine. I cut back on anything with caffeine for the past week and i feel alot better. Just thought id post this incase someone has the same problem and searches for it 6 months down the road.

okay, i had all my tests done - the full works. Blood work, xrays etc. My heart is really strong, there are no abnormal beats, resting heart rate is awesome, blood is great (good amount of iron), and the best of all my doctor said my cholesterol level is incredible even for my age. It looks like the problem was caffeine. I cut back on anything with caffeine for the past week and i feel alot better. Just thought id post this incase someone has the same problem and searches for it 6 months down the road.


makes sense........just curious as to how much caffeine you were consuming daily? i tend to drink more than my fair share of coffee but i've never noticed the condition you first described then again i tend not to wear my HRM all day so i may have missed it.

Did they do a treadmill stress test?

makes sense........just curious as to how much caffeine you were consuming daily? i tend to drink more than my fair share of coffee but i've never noticed the condition you first described then again i tend not to wear my HRM all day so i may have missed it.

i dont consume a ton of caffeine. Mostly green tea in the morning, maybe a coffee or 2 in the afternoon. Caffeine has allways affected me in the wrong way though. i dont really need a pickup in the morning so ive never bothered to start drinking coffee religously.

Did they do a treadmill stress test?
no. Think i should get one?

no. Think i should get one?

I was thinking that that would be the best way to attempt to duplicate what was happening to you. But if you stop the caffiene and it never happens again, then I guess it would be the caffiene. If I were you I would make sure that an experienced cardiologist read my ekg.

I have had the funny heart beats after drinking too much caffiend, but never like you describe.

I for sure would seriously talk to my doctor about it further testin should the problem happen again OFF caffiene.

I was thinking that that would be the best way to attempt to duplicate what was happening to you. But if you stop the caffiene and it never happens again, then I guess it would be the caffiene. If I were you I would make sure that an experienced cardiologist read my ekg.

I have had the funny heart beats after drinking too much caffiend, but never like you describe.

I for sure would seriously talk to my doctor about it further testin should the problem happen again OFF caffiene.
i had an ekg done and the cardiologist said my heart was working perfectly. Im going to slowly integrate tea back into my schedule and stay away from coffee and see what happens.

Just to make sure, have you ruled out interference? Mine goes batty near grocery stores sometimes, which I believe is caused by the door monitors (x band radar).

atrial tach or arythmia (?)

you could die tomorrow

or you could live to at least ... 57? (next yr it'll be 58...)

happened to have this same conversation with another rider last week. She wears a HRM regularly since having had a procedure that deals with nerve signal problems that cause the atria to go into rapid contractions... Apparently, for her, the procedure didn;t really work.
Was on a planned longer ride and in the middle of a group 'effort' she announced she had to drop back and told us not to worry. I dropped back also to see if she needed help or what. She then explained her condition. We then rode and conversed about it for the rest of the ride. Explained I have had the same cindition for quite a while.
me - I go into the same thing whenever I hit 196 BPM, I know if I keep uppin the effort the HR will go skyward of 225 to 250, instantly (its not powerlines, bad reading, fullmoon or LSD). I drop the effort and within 15 secs I'm back in the high 180s. Have had this condition, along with a general HR arrythmia since detected, back in '71.
hopin to turn 58 next yr...
if not, itz been a fun ride
YMMV

I was thinking that that would be the best way to attempt to duplicate what was happening to you.
+1 on that.
If you told the doc how the issue came up (under strong exercise) then he was just going thru the motions doin just an EKG. If that turned out 'normal', then he should have gone to the next step and replicate the 'conditions' that cause it in the 1st place - a stress test.
If that brings on the rapid heart beat then you;re gonna have another problem, and that is to decide what, if any, of the extreme measures the docs will prolly prescribe will be considered.
But its always better to know the score than to live with the unknown.
I'm actually surprised how many others I run into who have a similar issue, and never really talk about it.

Rule out caffeine, stay off the stuff for some days, then do your own stress test by doin your exercise routine and get the HR really up, then see if it jumps into hyperdrive. If you can't get it to sky, then maybe its caffeine related and you can make adjustments. If it still hapens, well then you can decide your next steps from there.
Let us know how things progress. I'm sure that there are a lot or BF readers who have some vested interest in hearing more on your story.
In the meantime, I'll ask Angie for more clinical detail and info on everything she went thru and how it all started. I'm a poor example in this, when it happens to me (which is most every hard ride/heavy exercise I do and have done for 30+ yrs) I just back it down enough to bring the HR back down and continue on.
Prolly not smart, but I just can;t get jacked up on every thing that goes wrong, especially somehting thatz happened so often and over such a long time span.
If I get more detail from angie, I'll post it here.

You could have AVNRT and need an ablation.


Sometimes, the electrical flow gets blocked or travels the same pathways repeatedly creating something of a “short circuit” that disturbs normal heart rhythms. Medicine often helps. In some cases, however, the most effective treatment is to destroy the tissue housing the short circuit. This procedure is called cardiac ablation. I had it and it totally cured me...no meds, no probs. I wanted it because it made me light headed and I do a lot of deep dives. It scared me, but turns out is was no big deal.

It isn't really dangerous and you may have had the pathway from birth. Play with your hydration status, and see if the problem lessens. I would flip into this when dehydrated and my atrial filling pressures dropped.

It is common for HRM to count "twice" if the amplitude of part of the waveform is too high.