erhan

I'll give some info about myself first: I'm 32, 183cm (6'0") tall , and 71kg (156lbs). I've been a smoker for 17 years, and I couldn't quit yet (I hate myself for that ). I'm down to 6-7/day though .

Here's today's results (46 min test ride - steep climb):
Resting: 61bpm (now 67 while typing ?)
Average HR: 151
Max HR: 173

My question is about how to determine my max HR. I tried some formulas that I found online. According to those calculations, my Max HR is supposed to be 185. But today I hit 173 (and I kept there for a little while), which is about 93-94% of 185 . It shouldn't be right, right? What else can I do to find out my maximum heart rate (except going to a doctor)?

Also, how is my HR results, considering my age, and my bad habit?

Thanks in advance for any advice

stevetone

The only reliable way to determine your individual maximum heart rate is to get an exercise stress test done. Having said that, a smoker that is out of shape could probably peg their heart rate pretty high even during minimal exertion. I would think that aggressively riding an hill would push it pretty high.

Habits can be broken -- why can't you quit?

Medpilot

A little off topic, but sorta relevant. I've always been a very casual smoker. I'll have a few smokes if I go out to the bars with my buds.

I just started cycling last month and I can really tell the difference the next day after having just a few smokes. I figured a few wouldn't hurt....Wrong. I'll be hacking up stuff for a couple of days after only having 3 or 4. I hope you can quit your bad habit. I know it's very difficult, but just think about how much better of a rider you will become by quitting…not to mention the health benefits and the money you’ll save to boot.

About the heart rate thing, there is the old generic way to figure out Max heart rate. 220 minus your age. Not the best way to figure things out, but it can get you in the ballpark...sorta.

I'm still sorta new at all this, but the way I would figure it out is to do an all out sprint for 60 seconds and see what HR you come up with. To get your max heart rate, you'll have to work hard enough to get yourself on the verge of puking. That’s probably the closest way next to doing a vo2 max test at the doctors.

operator

That formula should be just outright rejected. Yeah it gets you in the "ballpark" but so does guessing. Without going to a lab and doing a incremental load stress to determine your max hr, the only other way would be to just stand up and go like crazy over a long hill.

velocity

I agree that Karvonen is not the magic formula and neither did they want it to be a industry standard when they developed it for research reasons only. Its just that everyone latched on to the idea that HR and intensity where linked in stone. The HRM is a great tool for those people that are going to measure their fitness increases over time. But as far as during the work out -though it is true that linearly the intesity will match the BPM up till where just before you go breathless- its at that point when you hit deflection that the HRM is no longer sugnificant to you and that you will only be able to hold on to what HPE that you can sustain for the given fitness level and activity that you have undertaken. It is not necessary to train your self past going breathless- as a matter of fact you have a great chance of hurting yourself with sustained anaerobic activity due to over exertion and getting to and holding near max HR's. I find it very cool to see OLN put up HR's of the racers on the screen where they will be cruising along in the peleton at speed and their HR is only like 135 BPM then in the last part where the "quacking" starts they reach up to an average of 186 BPM for the last minute or so where they litterally blow up. So as we become more fit the idea is to see those efforts become easier at a certain range of numbers or that we can hold those higher numbers for longer working as close to our max HR whilestill using air for the fuel mixture.
Velocity

operator

One can only hope that power meters will become common enough in a couple years time to bring them below $100.