Originally Posted by
PeteHski
I agree, although it's pretty easy to measure your HR max (assuming you have no medical conditions). A good 20 min warm-up, including a few very short high intensity intervals. Then all it takes is a handful of VO2 max intervals, typically 2-4 mins duration. You probably won't max out your HR on the first interval, but you will be pretty much there after 2 or 3 intervals with only short recoveries between them. e.g. repeated 3 min VO2 max intervals with 1 min recovery.
True, but I don't generally advise folks who aren't in pretty good shape to do so. I leave it up to them to figure out if they can/want/need to.
FWIW, for most of us in out 50s and up knowing what out aerobic and threshold zones feel like is pretty key and likely good enough for general fitness riding. How well you can carry on a conversation or even sing is a good indicator. I often use that rather than look at the HR monitor, but like the records for looking at later to evaluate the ride and also to look at longer term trends. Someone could fudge a max HR number that gave them the right threshold in their workouts and the data would still be useful for most general fitness riding purposes. I wouldn't have been satisfied with that kind of records when I was younger and racing, but these days (at 71) it would be fine if I didn't know any better.