Drew Eckhardt 

I'm 42 and 5'9.5"

[TABLE]
[TR]
[TD][/TD]
[TD]2012/12/18[/TD]
[TD]2014/05/19[/TD]
[TD]2015/09/04[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]weekly hours riding[/TD]
[TD]1-2[/TD]
[TD]6-7[/TD]
[TD]10-11[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]weight (pounds)[/TD]
[TD]190[/TD]
[TD]186[/TD]
[TD]136[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]BP[/TD]
[TD]136/90[/TD]
[TD]153/84[/TD]
[TD]111/61[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]pulse[/TD]
[TD]77[/TD]
[TD]74[/TD]
[TD]48[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]total cholesterol[/TD]
[TD]244[/TD]
[TD]185[/TD]
[TD]181[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]LDL cholesterol[/TD]
[TD]166[/TD]
[TD]131[/TD]
[TD]112[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]HDL cholesterol[/TD]
[TD]61[/TD]
[TD]55[/TD]
[TD]74[/TD]
[/TR]
[/TABLE]

I'm still out of shape from crashing in June and loosing a month of riding so that's OK.

Before that my LTHR was 168 and VT1 around 140 with a 185 maximum. LTHR may have slipped a bit and I am no longer good for 1:20 at 93% of FTP averaging 156 bpm.

Drew Eckhardt 

Formulas are completely useless because there's a 12 bpm standard deviation, so two sigmas out you have a +/- 24 range with a prescribed intensity varying from endurance pace to not physically possible. Even getting within 5% isn't good enough, because that's all that separates what you can manage for 1 hour not 20 minutes or 20 minutes not 10.

To set zones ride as hard as you can for 30 minutes and take your average over the last 20. That's your lactate threshold heart rate, anaerobic threshold, AnT, or VT2. It varies as fraction of maximum heart rate.

Ride as hard as you can for 4-6 hours. Rated Perceived Exertion should not increase over the second half. Or note as hard as you can ride while having a conversation, without breathing rhythmically, without feeling lactate in your legs. That's your aerobic threshold, AeT, or VT1.

StanSeven

Sorry I didn't see your prior post.

Bad_Luck_Blonde

I think it has benefited me,
I'm 19, so far this year I have ridden 3,400 miles

I'm
5' 11"
151 lbs
My resting heart rate is 43 and my blood pressure is 95/62

I also swam competitively for 10 years, the last half of which I spent 9 hours a week in the pool. I have no clue which has had a larger a larger impact.

lupy

Wow! What a major change in a little over a year! Any major changes besides time on the bike? Honestly BP looks like meds changed it, but your weight loss was drastic too, which probably caused it.

TimothyH

Heart rate varies so widely that it is useless to compare from person to person. 220-age or any other age based calculation is wildly inaccurate and equally as useless.

Max Heart Rate (HRMax) is good to know but is only relevant as it relates to your Lactic Threshold (LT). A higher LT allows you to go harder for a longer period of time. LT is highly trainable. For cyclists, everything is measured as a percent of LT.

Asking "What's your average heart rate?" is like asking "how much money to you have in your wallet right now?"

yooperbiker

The common 220-age formula is very rough. The better formula is 208 - (0.7 x age). And yes I know that this is just an estimate, but seems pretty close for many people I've talked with.

Fitness seems to have a much greater effect on resting heart rate, while one's maximum heart rate just seems to go down with age no matter what. Max heart rate not a good indicator of fitness level, thats for sure.

I am 61, 183 lbs, RHR:52, MaxHR seen:165 Just back into cycling this year after a few years cruising in a sailboat. Lost 20 lbs over the summer.

Athens80

Cycling promotes health.

If your cardiologist just stares at you upon learning that your resting heart rate and blood pressure are in a healthy range (e.g. 50 to 70 bpm) I'd take that as a first possible indicator that this cardiologist might not turn out to be the one for you.

jimincalif

Age 57, 205 lbs (down 30 in the last 2.5 yrs)

RHR (in the morning before getting up) - 49
While riding over last 5 months (3000 miles since getting a reliable HR monitor) avg HR 124, max 184.
On meds for blood pressure, but the doc has been able to reduce the meds since I started riding again 2 yrs ago. usually in the 130-140/85-97 range.

caloso

44 bpm resting
191 bpm max (observed, not some bogus formula)
48 candles

deacon mark

54 years, rhr 39-42, max in past few months 161.Weight 176 6'2, have had high blood pressure since age 12 no joke, been taking meds 42 years on losartan 50mg. Runner too with 74,000 lifetime miles running. The HBP has all the Drs wondering many many test esp years ago as kid. Have lots of endurance.

Machka 

Losing 50 lbs in the last 8 months has benefited me. I've been cycling since I was 6 so I can't really say it has made a difference.

Age: 48
BP: 88/55
Resting HR: 54

Yeah, I'm having some difficulty with low blood pressure. It's not always that low, but it does get low enough to cause some discomfort.

redfooj

last 2 rides:

3.0hrs nonstop 180 avg 196 max
2.5hrs nonstop 166 avg 200 max

VNA

Thank you absolutely correct.

rideBjj

If you ride at all regularly and with any intensity, and your resting HR isn't at least 60bpm or less, then something isn't right. It doesn't take that much to get a resting, first thing in the morning HR of < 60.

That being said, the real test of cardio fitness is really not your resting HR. It's how long it takes to get from your max, back down to resting.

chaadster

Word.

But it's hard to talk about recovery, isn't it? Too soft or something.

bikepro

You are correct, however, cold weather does not affect your blood, but it will cause your blood vessels to constrict, resulting in higher blood pressure.

Effect of cold on the blood vessel wall. - PubMed - NCBI

catgita

Yes, that was discussed as well, but in this article they specifically discussed the heart rate dropping dangerously low at night, using a heart rate monitor with an alarm to wake them up, and having a stationary in the room to get the heart rate back up. The athletes complained it was hard to get good sleep on nights like that.

Baldy1953

I am 62 years old.
Wt. 175-180
ht 5'7"
Bp after riding is 93/55 or in that neighborhood. 120-130/75 in am before riding. Take bp medicine
resting heart rate is around 60-70
When riding, try not to exceed 160. mostly between 140-150 when pushing a bit

icyclist 

I'm pushing 68. Weight is 164 and I'm 5.11.

Heart rate on wake-up this morning: 44 (the usual).

Heart rate 2.75 hours ago: 183 for a few moments - not usual for me, but I have to have fun once in a while.

Heart rate now: 55

I know that formulas are only guidelines. I've always had a relatively low heart rate, whether I exercise or not (of course it goes down the more I exercise). I've always been able to exceed the average maximum heart rate for people my age.

merlinextraligh

The 90's called and want their post back

GravelMN

I've got a RHR in the 50s, max HR of somewhere in the high 180s (peaked once at just over 200 for a few seconds, but only once in the last two years, haven't broken 190 since) and BP in the 120s / 60s - low 70s. Not bad for a 52-year old with a history of morbid obesity, hypertension, and a very bad family medical history.

Several years after taking up cycling to lose weight and improve a lifetime of poor cardiovascular fitness, I had two heart attacks about a year apart. I've had several individuals say things along the line of "See, all that bike riding didn't do you any good. You had a heart attack anyway (or It gave you a heart attack). On the contrary, according to my cardiologist, between my family history of early heart disease and my years of obesity, the heart attacks were inevitable. What the cycling did was build collateral circulation and cause other physiological changes that possibly saved my life. If I had either of these heart attacks a decade ago when I was horrifically out of shape and over 300#, it would likely have been fatal or severely debilitating. Thanks in large part to those several years of cycling, I returned to work two weeks after hospital discharge with virtually no heart damage after each heart attack. If I had taken up serious cycling in my teens or 20s I might have avoided them all together, but even starting in my early 40s after decades of poor health habits, it made a HUGE difference when my personal and family history caught up to me at 50.

I've also heard through the grape vine that some have said that I had "minor" heart attacks. Well, the first was a 95+% occlusion in the proximal right coronary artery that feeds the majority of the right side of the heart. The second was a 95+% occlusion of the proximal left anterior descending artery that feeds the septum, the front and part of the left side of the heart. The second one occluded completely in hospital as they were preparing to place the stent.

Today is the one-year anniversary of my last hospital discharge (my second heart attack was on the morning of 11-8-14) and even though it's only 45F and windy, I can't wait to get out for a ride.

Hypno Toad

Age 46
weight 165
height 6'0"
rhr 42
maxhr 185

I'm a daily rider with 5,850 miles year-to-date in 2015

Dan333SP

My resting heart rate is 48 BPM and my VO2 Max is in the Uber High Elite range. Just sayin'.

Robius

This is some intense riding, duh.