Some information for determining Max. HR......Your Maximum Heart Rate - How to Establish It and How It is Used

I'm not a cardiologist. Maybe max hr doesn't change and it's all a matter of perception but I can say that the max hr that I could reach when pushing myself as hard as I could certainly changed. There may be some theoretical number that doesn't change but when your lungs aren't delivering enough O2 and your muscles aren't using what they get efficiently and your heart isn't strong and you're overweight by 50lb you'll find yourself huffing and puffing and getting aerobic at a pretty low heart rate. In my case I absolutely was pushing as hard as I possibly could and would be anaerobic and totally shot when my heart rate got a few beats over 130 and an all out effort could get me to 138 before I would be completely blown out. Fast forward two years, drop that 50lb (actually I've lost 95lb total), add 10,000 mi of training and I was able to sit for 20-30min at a heart rate of 153 and I could maintain 140-145 for reasonably long periods. I recorded max HR around 174 in all-out efforts.
Previously it would have been absolutely impossible for me to get my heart rate up to 155 let alone 174. That change wasn't a matter of not being able to stress my body and simply learning to push harder. I would be totally anaerobic at a much lower heart rate, unable to push and further and that is pretty much the definition of max HR.
Your max hr isn't just a matter of the heart...how hard you can push depends on your lungs, muscles, arteries and all sorts of body/fitness issues are affected.
Personal stories don't count for much; perhaps there -could- have been some way for me to ride harder and get my HR up further but I don't think so. Possibly the term max hr is being used differently here, but I can say that with a sweat inducing, gasping for breath full tilt effort I used to only be able to get my HR up to 135 and a few years later it was 175.

I bet none of us middle age cyclists with higher than predicted max heart rates have ever taken statins for cholesterol.

55 yo

58 resting HR

178 Max (as far as I have pushed it)

These are my three zones

<105 HR on Recovery days

105-120 HR long rides

140-152 HR hard rides

Hills.......whatever it takes. Not enough base to do intervals yet

I'm on statins now and my cardio meds have dramatically lowered my max hr. Now I'm back to where 140 is right about my tipping point for moving into anaerobic time. 157 is pretty close to the highest number I can get to but I'll know more after a stress test in a week or so....but they have me off the hr lowering statin the morning of the test so I can raise my HR in a "normal" fashion. I have to remember to ask my cardiologist if I can't just skip my magic pill the morning of a race...

Max HR of 175 to 157. When did the statins enter the picture?

Curious if any endurance athletes here went on statins and did not feel muscular weakness, inability to recover from workouts, or lower max heart rate.

Never have, never will. MHR way above the silly formula.

Don in Austin

I take 10mg nightly. That's after a heart attack (although I admit I was taking a much higher dose and I had a couple of potential side-effect: rhabdomyolysis and muscle pain). I eat well and exercise. At 66, my highest recent high HR hit 187; occasionally it drops to 39.

Funny, I don't read this as bragging.

But it does give me hope that as I get in better shape (and stay in shape over time) my rhr will drop. Also people gave numbers about the drop in heart rate after workload is stopped. I have read this one of the most important number, but not a range of expected values. My other numbers do concern me. But somewhat relieved that what I thought of as a fast recovery is actually pretty good. Not great, but pretty good.

Where training really makes an impact is resting heart rate and the time to recover. Exercising makes the heart muscle stronger and it functions better. That means a higher volume of blood pumped per stroke so it doesn't have to beat as fast for the same flow level.

lol... ask your significant other.

But actually we are "bragging" about how rapidly our phalluses shrink after the deed, and how small they are at rest.

My family doc has me on low-dose statins for borderline high cholesterol for the past 5 years.
However, I am a heavy caffeinator which probably bumps my HR up.

57yo female
not sure of resting HR, probably high 50s-low-60s
187 mhr (observed 186 on hills, 187 on treadmill stress test). So what, who cares.
HR < 105 is standing next to bicycle.
Easy ride I average HR 135-150
Basic rides I average HR 150-155. I try to keep it under 160 except hills.
Short hard rides I average HR 155-169 (ouch!)
Threshhold is about 168-169.

When I first started riding, HR around 135-140 would just cook me. Over the years my ability to use the oxygen in my red blood cells got better, and the RBC are bigger with more hemoglobin.
My lactate tolerance has improved.
There are also technique factors involved. Learn how to relax muscles when they aren't being used for propulsion or stability at the second.
It improves circulation and riding economy (or efficiency, I forgot which).

Also my HR drops very quickly when I back off the pace. I can do a 10-minute hill HR 168 to a stop sign and HR will drop to 135 in less than 30 seconds at the stop as long as I am not overheated.

Back to OP: Articles written to the general populace vary wildly. The target audience of much advice is people who are completely sedentary and have no history of physical exercise. Many of these people hate the idea of exertion and will not even try exercise if it will make them unduly uncomfortable. Another set of people will go in full-blast, over-exert, and will injure themselves or find themself too exhausted to make it a sustainable habit. It is wise for a slow build-up to strengthen joints and the muscles that provide stabilization. Some people may have undiagnosed heart disease or other health issues.

Personally I am more concerned of the diseases associated with a sedentary lifestyle. I get my numbers checked and passed a stress test and listen to my body. I am motivated to be active by performance-oriented goals. Others are motivated in other ways and a more laid-back approach may suit them best. It's all good. Just establish good habits of being active in ways that make you healthier.

As a "middle aged" 72 year old committed "roadie" I can only report what I have encountered in 40 years of mostly hard training with time off for recovery from back fusion, kidney surgery, cataracts and two "cardiac ablations". Currently coming back from the fusion a year and a half ago.
Max HR is 163 as determined by running stress test "to the end"(the cycling number is pretty close). Current resting pulse is 45 at complete recovery. No statins-Total cholesterol 160-170 and HDL always above 60.
I have a cardiologist who treats Olympic athletes and an Electrophysiologist who runs the department at UC San Diego (cardiac ablations). I have suffered with A Fib for about 7 years and had two cardiac ablations. I found that lowering body fat and more cycling above 140 bpm (85% of max) actually lowered the incidents of AF. Also episodes only last 1 - 3 seconds. As I generally ride alone on weekdays I train with Strava and have picked up a few segment firsts (65+) as my fitness returns. Weekends I ride with groups of younger riders and usually red-line a couple times per ride at sustained high speeds and hit my max heart rate once or twice a week. In some articles I have read the max heart rate isn't as important as the difference between resting and max HR. About 15 years ago my max was about 210 and resting HR was 38. At that level I won a lot of TT's. I would dearly love to have a higher max HR as the difference would be higher.

I haven't read the whole thread, so I apologize if some of this stuff has already been addressed. But here I go.

Everyone's heart rate range is different, therefore asking others what is a good HR is just worthless.

If you're "training" (trying to achieve some racing or speed goal), you need to know either your maximum HR or lactate threshhold. Maximum? Find the HR that you were literally on the verge of collapse and add 5. Hard to do. LT? go at a serious race pace (as in an actual race where you're doing your best) for 45 minutes to an hour and take the average. This is a good defined, LT - it's the HR at which you aren't building up lactate because you couldn't go that fast if you were building it up. This number can also be thouht of as your "race pace" so that if you are supposed to do intervals at something like 110% of "race pace" you know what that effort will be and not do it too hard or too easy.

Your training should be done in control. So many cyclists think train hard train often, be a stud is the way to go, but that's stupid training. You don't see serious runners doing that. It could be because most runners have had coaches at one time and have been taught basic principles of training. Many or most cyclists have never had cycling coaching and maybe not even running, skiing or swimming coaching.

SOme basic principles, which will really do nearly as well as more intricate programs are:
* You need adequate rest to improve
* You should do about 80% of your training at about 70% of your max HR. That 70% level really is very similar to easy conversation level and that criterion can be used as a surrogate for actually knowing the HR. With running, you can kind of control this at all times. With biking (and skiing) you kind of have to look at the average for the entire workout because there's going to be uphills and downhills which will go over and under that good HR
* The other 20% should be "Quality" hard work - designed to increase your race pace, anaerobic threshold or something else. There's a bunch of types of intervals, but they should be quality hard work and you can't have quality hard work if all of your other work outs (the other 80%) are too hard to let your body recover
* The worst thing you can do is spend a lot of time in the "junk" zones - 80-90% of max HR. Unfortunately, this is the effort a lot of us enjoy doing. It's more fun - it feels like you're working, going fast, but not killing yourself - and requires less discipline than the 70% range. But, if you do that, your hard days won't be as hard and as good quality as they could be because you're not recovered well, and therefore not as productive.
** All this is to say, your easy days need to be almost boringly easy, building base but letting your body recover and build capacity after the strain of the hard days - and therefore you'll be able to put more effort into your hard days.
* The easy days can involve some pickups - like sprints to the street sign, some short hill hammers, etc, but they should be short, just a few per ride, and have full recovery afterwards.
* If you're struggling to keep up with a group, count that as your weekly (or twice weekly) "hard day". Another hard day could be some hill repeats. But if you do this stuff too often, you might indeed progress, but it won't be the maximum progression you could make had you trained smarter.

I've trained for skiing using these principles and really progressed. WHen I kind of gave up being disciplined and programmed and just skied as I felt like (usually in the "junk" zone), I definitely plateaued out and/or decreased.

"Better fitness through rest" and "train smarter, not harder" should be your mantras

For recommended heart rate, my cardiologist recommends anything above 0