berny

I've been social MTB riding with reasonably high effort for about five years. I recently had a cardiologist do some tests to check BP and heart fitness levels. I've have had an irregular HR all my life and my BP was a tad high. An ultrasound detected a leaky valve. I was advised it wasn't a major problem and I should continue cycling but to avoid weights.

I began riding my road bike again late last year, training with a tri bunch. We do aprox 50k at an average in the low 30k's.
This year I've started racing and at present I'm doing crits Sunday morning and Monday night. I'm managing it much better now that I spin down to facilitate recovery Tuesday and Wednesday on my commute and begin to wind up again Thursday and Friday in prep for Sat., Sun. and Monday. I don't use a HR monitor. I rely solely on my own perception of my ability to do what I gotta do at any given time.

It's getting easier and my race results improve weekly so I think I'm managing quite well but I wonder what the cardiologist would make of my current endeavour and training/racing campaign???
In light of the above, maybe I should give him a call.
Oh I'm 63, 64 in April.

BaadDawg

I'm 53 and have been active all my life. Probably 10-15 pounds heavier than I would like but have been the same weight for 15 years or longer. Doc looks at me like I'm nuts when I tell him I want to lose weight but just plain eat as much or more than I burn off.

I started spinning classes about a year ago and had been inactive since late October when the bike season wound down up here in the frozen tundra we call Canada. I had never paid much attention to HR.

In spinning they constantly talk about what HR you are at, what zone to go in and to check your pulse regularly during the class, so I did. Granted I was out of shape the 1st few weeks and the classes were killers, but I was shocked at how high my HR was. Resting was 60's waking up was 50's but on the bike at the highest was 200 or more, sustained 185-190 on the really high intensity stuff. Got a HR monitor and sure enough those were my rates. Once warmed up cruising was 150-160. When spring came I went out as soon as I could, cold, windy and I freaked out to see I was in the 180's steady without even feeling like I was exerting myself that much. My wife was telling me I was overdoing it and to back off.

Instead I went to my family doctor, himself a real workout fiend and my age and he ordered a stress test and a visit to a cardiologist, but felt that nothing was wrong unless the test came back with abnormalities. Tests were normal.

Got rid of the monitor and immediately felt better not being so preoccupied with my HR.

Long and the short of it is that I rode 5,000km from April to October and decided to get a monitor again just to see what difference being in such good shape had made.

Bingo freakout time again. Cruising at a good pace (I'm no racer) into a medium headwind on the flats once warmed up without feeling especially tired mid 180's. Climbing up a short hill (sprinting actually) high 190's. I am sure that in the mountains I go over 205.

Went back to the doc freaked out and he sent me at my request to a different cardiologist, one involved in research and working in the Heart Institute. He had me take a nuclear stress test and when the results came back told me to do whatever I want at any heart rate I want for as long as I want, i.e. no restrictions. I forgot to mention that the 1st cardiologist I went to told me even though the tests were normal, that he would not exceed 85% max HR as the studies show that "extreme" athletes have poorer long term prognosis (i.e. croak younger) than the general population. I did not follow his advice, and the 2nd cardiologist confirmed that in my case at least, it was his opinion that I could workout at what ever zone I wanted to.

Got rid of the HR monitor again this time for good. I know many people swear by them, for me it just makes me nervous as hell and I seem to know my body well enough to get a pretty good feel for what zone I am in anyways. The only time I might help me would be on recovery rides, because it's hard (for me) to stay in the low zones. Have to really back off.

My 2 cents.

skydive69

I would opine that your maxium HR is a bit high. Contrary to popular opinion, MHR comes down with conditioning. I used to incorrectly believe the opposite until reading two excellent treatises on the subject. That bit about elite athletes is the current "in" thing in that Dr. Cooper of the famous Aerobic Clinic in Dallas has come off his old beliefs of training hard indicating that hard training leads to a build up of free radicals which is what tends to kill us. He now is a big proponent of walking rather than hard running.

The best example of an elite athlete that I know of that debunks that opinion is a member of our St. Petersburg Bike Club. His name is John Sinibaldi. He was a two-time cycling olympian ('32 & '36) and a 10 time national cycling champion. He rides at least 5 times a week, and cranks down the street easily at 22 mph with no exertion. When he was 80, he was still winning sprints in the sprint zones on our rides. He has the bearing and gait of a young man. I want to be like him when I grow up!

I always wear my Polar S520 on my rides.

Smokey

Very interesting, Dawg. Just curious however: Are you suggesting - given the high HR readings that you've attained with the monitor - that the MONITOR is off? If so, than I can understand you dumping the thing (inaccurate and all).

Or, perhaps (and I'm asking here) are you telling us that, when you wear the HR monitor, you push yourself (perhaps not entirely consciously) a bit too hard? If that's the case, then, again, I can see why you might choose to forego using the thing.

If, on the other hand, the readings are generally accurate, how is it your benefit to NOT know what's going on with your heart, particularly if you're as concerned about the high readings as you seem to be? Getting rid of the monitor in that case is akin to bashing out the red warning light on your car dashboard with the nearest blunt object.

BaadDawg

Well I was concerned at the beginning simply because while I have been active all my life I never paid much attention to my HR. Now that I have been cleared after extensive testing I just find it less hassle working out without the HR. And my high HR's were accurate. It's genetic one's max HR and the formula is pretty off the mark for many people (like me).

berny

And me also I think.
FWIW; I'm very very sceptical of the opinions 'experts', particularly in the field of medicine. They tend to change their minds with the seasons. What is absolute inarguable fact this year will be just so much balderdash next. So, where does that leave me? Well I believe in myself. I believe that I most often know best what is good for me. I believe that my body is way way more capable than I could ever imagine and often will excel in spite of my mind. I believe that negativity is the big destroyer and that being very positive is more beneficial than all the pills and concoctions so eagerly prescribed by physicians. I tent not to take what they say too seriously and my history with there moderate interventions in my life backs my belief.
So I understand BaadDawg fully when he says wearing a HRM is a distraction and an unnecessary continuing negative reminder of one's susceptibility to possibly inaccurate and irrelevant input.
Put simply I put my faith is in other areas.

skydive69

Great philosophical outlook, and as my friend and teammate Dr. George Sheehan used to say, "we are all an experiment of one."

oldspark

Interesting that you would find a hrm distracting-I find it to be just the opposite. To each is own, makes the world go around.

skydive69

I agree - I do every ride with mine - it gives me a good insight into my effort, conditioning, etc. I would no more think of not using it then I would not using a computer that tracks what I do on the bike.

BaadDawg

I am not saying that HR monitors are not a good training tool. I just found that it is not for me and that my experiences might be of benefit to others. I am sure I was not the first to strap on a HR monitor and go "holy cow" am I gonna kill myself? And I have been very active all my life, biking, swimming, backpacking etc. In my case ignorance is bliss when it come to my HR.

berny

And I'm presently enjoying immensely riding/racing without a computer. I just haven't swapped mine of my old bike yet but I have to say that it's been a real pleasure, to not be continually checking to see if I'm working as hard as the computer would suggest is best and simply trusting in my intuition. I think the computer on my shoulders is probably a little more sophisticated than a tiny black plastic box with a few little man made processors worth about $80 bucks. But then that's just me.

BaadDawg

The owner of my lbs (35 and now retired to the south of France---don't believe your lbs when they cry they aren't making money off you lol) told me that he no longer uses a computer. I was in shock (I was having him install my Flite Deck). He said he knows what his cadence is by feel, who cares how far you go (he goes plenty far enough when he gets time to ride) and he felt much more liberated without one.

Ain't ditching my Flite Deck just yet though, it's nice to see what gear you are in without having to look back at the cassette and half kill yourself in the process.

berny

My new Ultegra 10 is FD compatible (one reason I'm prolonging transferring the old one) and I'm really tempted to get one for the reasons you elude to above.

sewupnut

I use HR strictly as a fitness guage - especially resting HR. And I keep a diary. I never use a monitor in a race or even during a fast training ride with other riders. Just have to go until there ain't nothin left. HR is irrelevant at those times. I worry more about not crossing wheels with somebody.

sun

jppe

Hey Dawg-if it helps you any, your and my HR's are very similar. My brother is a lot younger than me and has been riding a lot longer than I have and it's interesting that his HR trends and mine are almost identical. The groups we ride with can't understand how our HR's can be so much higher than their's but we've learned that it's just genetics and go on with it.

If you used the rule of thumb, 225 bpm minus age, my max should be in the low 170's. I easily hit the mid 190's when trying to elevate the rate to see what my max is. I still wear a HR monitor, especially for training, as I need to know how my workouts are going.

Welcome to the Mile High HR Club!

BaadDawg

I have been very happy with my wireless Flitedeck. Changing modes from the hoods is also very nice. Plus it has a clock on it so I now know the time which used to be a pain with my other computer. There is no option for 12 hour time though, only 24 hour mode, Euro style. The manual is awful, and the modes are a bit weird. You get 1 set of menu options in each mode and cannot choose which ones are in each mode. Changing modes requires a 2 second hold on the left grip button and it's not something you want to be doing every few minutes. The right button menu screens change immediately.

The main annoyance is that total trip distance is in one mode and cannot be seen if you are in the cadence mode. I think that is my peeve, it has been 4 months since I have ridden outside due to living in Canada and feeling like a penguin. The virtual cadence works fine, as good as the wired cadence I havce on my other bike. No good on a trainer though since there is no pedal sensor, just the sensor on the front wheel and fork.


As far as my high HR's that is no longer something I even think about anymore. I was put on a beta blocker in January as a migraine preventative (after suffering for 2 years with almost daily migraines and exercise was one of the triggers, the other still is alcohol). Gave up booze pretty much entirely, something I am not happy about at all, but I have come to associate alcohol (even 1 beer) with a 12 hour headache and a fist full of pain medications so it has really not been hard to give up in the least. Just makes life a bit more boring is all.

The beta blocker is nadolol and is about the lowest dose that you can take of the stuff (20mg) but that is enough to really mess with your HR. Slows it way down, especially under load. But because the dose is so low (it's actually half of the lowest recommended dose) I do not feel the fatigue that the higher doses can cause.

Still with such a lose dose my headaches have virtually gone away and my workouts don't seem to have suffered too much. Will really find out when I hit the hills on the bike.

Used to get palipitations and what felt lke funnu runs of weird feeling HR's and that has really calmed down with the low dose beta blocker. Have always had that and seems to be nothing.

stapfam

Funny you should mention Similar heart rates. I ride a Tandem, I am 58 and Pilot is 40. There is a vast difference on our heart rates on solos, and he just loses me on the uphills. My max for Age is 165 and I can get to 175 before getting off the bike and lying down. He can go 20 above me all the time, but at 195 (20 above me again) he hits the same bit of Grass or Mud that I am going to fall off on.
However on the Tandem, we run at a very similar heart rate, between one or two of each other. When I am at 150 then so is he. We try not to go above 160 in defferance to my age, but occasionally we do have to push to 165, and at that we are both getting tired. I cannot say that he is carrying me as same heart rate and same amount of tiredness. The difference is, For that odd hill where the effort does have to go in,(To save pushing the bike uphill) he can go up to the 190's, and drag me up to around 175 with him. I can assure you, we are both absolutely shatterred then and have to slow down for about 2 miles to recoup our energy.

Incidentally, we put an HRM on the fit 50 year old in our group.He is the one that will lose everyone including the 25 year olds on our rides. That was the day when the tandem riders went to 165 all the way up a steep long hill. We were shifting. He stayed with us all the way up, and admitted that at the top he was shattered. His breathing was very laboured, legs like jelly and body shattered-- He was done in. His Heart rate did not get above 152 as a max for the hill, and we thought it was a duff HRM. it was not his heart rate is lower than the rest of us, and this has been checked on several occasions. He just has a slow heart rate.

Edit

Baaddawg.

Thanks for enlightening me. I have had Migraines for as long as I can remember. After the bypass, I was on beta blockers but it affected my riding so I weaned off them in the following year. For the year or so I was on BB's, I did not have a Migraine. Given the choice now, I will keep the occasional migraine as I am enjoying my riding too much to go down a level again.

BaadDawg

Have to honestly say that at the super low dose I am at now (20mg nadolol) that is is enough to keep the headaches under control (I still get them but they are manageable now whereas before they were unmanageable)...acutally they went away almost completely at 40mg still a very low dose but at 40mg I felt tired, my BP seemed too low, my HR seemed to low and I am sure my max HR really went down. Tried 20mg and so far (about a month) it seems to be a happy medium. Some headaches but manageable and no noticeable side efects from the BB.

berny

I've been thinking about a possible link between caffeine and HR.
As I've previously stated I have an irregular heart rhythm. I went off caffeine some while ago and my rhythm settled significantly. Recently I've been allowing myself to indulge again and my rhythm has gone wild again. I'm back OFF coffee/chocolate etc.
I know that lately many high exertion sportspersons have suffered from dangerous fibrillation and a few are now relying on implanted pacemakers to keep them alive. I also know that many of these athletes use/used caffeine in high doses as a stimulant to achieve a higher output. Could there be a correlation??? Maybe caffeine is a more powerful, more disruptive drug than we all imagine. When you think about it we consume significant quantities in our daily lives in coffee, tea, chocolate, Coke etc.

Does anyone know of a study? Could be interesting to find out just what effect it has particularly on our HR'ms. It could explain the recent incidence of uncharacteristic breakdowns in elite triathletes maybe. Just a thought.

skydive69

I wonder how much caffeine is in those little mini Hershey bars? I love to pop a couple of them after luch with some nuts and raisins. I am also surprised that colas do not list the amount of caffeine they contain.

After having my one and only (so far) episode of Afib, I went off of cola, chocolate and alcohol, but human nature being what it is, I have slowly worked myself back. Fortunately, I drink no coffee or tea, and only have one diet Dr. Pepper a day, and I have no idea how much caffeine is contained in said Dr. Pepper versus the amount in a typical cup of coffee or tea.

DnvrFox

You need to always distinguish between atrial fibrillation (not usually dangerous if controlled with meds) and ventricular fibrillation - life threatening.

Saying someone is in "fibrillation" does not pass the specificity test.

berny

I'm not sure what your point is Dnvr????
I know there's a difference but I doubt the elite athletes I mentioned who are fitted with implants, have them for a/fib and if caffeine is a rhythm destabilser it should be avoided in either case. Irregular heat rythms are a bloody nuisance at best.

DnvrFox

Sorry. To me, it is sort of like saying someone has "cancer." Doesn't tell you enough - some cancers are very mild and treatable, others are deadly.

Guess I have had too many folks ask me if I was going to get a pacemaker because they heard I have "fibrillation."

tedward

As I see it, the heart is a variable frequency and variable stroke pump. The combination of these two variables yields a particular blood flow.
This intensity of this flow can be recognised by a feeling of "Perceived Effort".

Heart monitors can detect the heart frequency rate OK
Can anyone tell me whether they either know or care a tinker's cuss about the VARIABLE stroke volume?

If they don't then I would consider them of limited value only.

Just a thought, as I don't have one, and wouldn't bother until this question is answered satisfactorily..

bikebrat

It's very normal for blood pressure to drop with increased physical activity . . . which is why exercise is prescribed as an "antidote" for hypertension . . . I am 50, have hypertension that is treated with meds, and during the summer - when I am riding between 150 and 200 miles per week - often have my BP drop to 90 something over 60 or 70 something