Average Maximum Heart Rate

OldHobo

As usual, I'm confused.
I'm on the treadmill at the gym today and decide to make a note of my heart rate, thinking that might be a useful metric to warrant increases in speed, time, or incline. Near the end of the middle phase, which is fastest and longest my heart rate was 157. Near the end of the 3rd and final phase, slower but a little steeper, it was 153. I was in no distress, breathing hard but closed mouth and could have spoken in short sentences if there was anybody to talk to.
Tonight I'm looking at The American Heart Association Target Heart Rate Page. It says a 65-year-old man, I'm 65, has an average maximum heart rate of 155 (220 - 65) and a target heart rate zone during exercise 50% to 85% of that which is 78 - 132 beat per minute.

What is Maximum Heart Rate? It sounds like an estimate of the fastest rate of which my heart capable. But I would think that at 100% of Max I would be in some physical distress. By the way, I have bum lungs (mild COPD).

So I'm inclined to assume my maximum target heart rate should actually be at least equal to or greater than 157. But since I don't know anything about it my assumptions and inclinations are not necessarily trustworthy.

The chart from The American Heart Association Page mentioned and linked to above is displayed below.

heybales

HRmax is indeed the fastest your heart could beat at max effort - has to be pretty fast ramping of effort to get there - or else the muscles frankly give out quick.

And what you read was an estimate. Bad estimate.

The 220-age formula assumes 1) everyone starts at same HRmax, and 2) it lowers steadily with age.

Neither is true, or has to be. Though 2 does end up happening.
Point 1 - some have a Honda heart, high revving to get needed blood pumped with desired oxygen levels, some have diesel heart, slower and big pushed of O2.

I'd suggest by your description of level of effort - you were in the middle of aerobic HR zone, 60-70% of HRmax.
Just do the math from there for a better HRmax to work with.
Then you can do some specific training there if Dr allows it.

And see how that zone improves with fitness. You should get to point of feeling the same level of effort (breathing rate, ect), but HR will be higher than it is now.

And yes, you could only sustain max for brief time, then perhaps time to puke or at least stop.

Here's another formula with the ranges.

www.calculatenow.biz/sport/heart.php?


Be aware too there are many reasons why HR can go up compared to other times - that has nothing to do with level of effort.

Keep the exact same effort over 1 hr - HR at the end will likely be higher than at the start (if you did a warmup first so HR is as low as it'll go).

Dehydrated - inflated.
Overheating - inflated.
Stressed - inflated.
Tired muscles - usually can't push as high.

spiriteagle99

The formula is wrong for a lot of us. I am a fairly fit 61 year old marathon runner. My maximum is something over 190. I am at 140 within a couple of minutes of starting my easy runs, and average around 160-165 for the bulk of my runs. Hills, speed bursts, etc. will get me above 180. I have not measured my HR on a race yet, but I'm sure it would be well over 180.

That said, take the numbers on your TM with a big grain of salt if you are getting the number from the handles. I find my TM and exercise bike handles completely useless. If I use the chest HRM band, it is a lot more accurate.

OldHobo

I have a Polar heart monitor but either the chest strap thingy or the watch is on the blink. Wasn't going to bother replacing it. It often got up into the 150 range while walking a couple years ago.

Vladimirnapkin

heybales wrote: »

The 220-age formula assumes 1) everyone starts at same HRmax, and 2) it lowers steadily with age.

Neither is true, or has to be. Though 2 does end up happening.
Point 1 - some have a Honda heart, high revving to get needed blood pumped with desired oxygen levels, some have diesel heart, slower and big pushed of O2.

It is extremely rare that I read a longish post and agree with pretty much 100% of it.

Vladimirnapkin

Oh, and I regularly hit heart rates above my predicted max.

Azdak

In the normal population distribution, all forumulas that purport to estimate HR max have a standard of error of anywhere from 8-12 beats/min. So quite a few people will have an actual HRmax that is higher than the predicted value.

You always want to compare HR readings with your feelings of perceived exertion. If you see a higher number, but feel like you are cruising, then it’s probably not a big deal.

If you do have COPD, either that or using an inhaler close to your workout can also drive HR a little higher than average.

AnvilHead

As others have said, the "220-age" is a rough estimate and has a considerable margin of error.

I'm 55 years old, so using that formula my HRmax would be 165 (my RHR is around 53). My heart rate routinely gets into the low/mid 150 range on my runs and I'm nowhere near out of breath or pushing hard - on an RPE scale of 1-10 such as this one, I'd put my RPE at around 4-5. I'm sweating (after a mile or so) and breathing harder than at rest, but not gasping for breath. It's a pretty comfortable pace and I can still pass the "talk test".

Using 165 as my theoretical maximum, a heart rate of 152 would be about 92% HRmax - a pretty high level of exertion, and a lot higher than what my RPE is indicating. I should be fully anaerobic, breathing heavily and unable to sustain that level for very long, which is definitely not the case.

I've never had my HRmax clinically tested, but I'm pretty confident that it's somewhere above the "220-age" estimate.

BitofaState

The HRmax=220-age formula also known as the Åstrand formula was developed for use in clinical settings for patients with heart conditions undergoing rehab. It has a Standard deviation of 12-14bpm so can be out for an individual in the normal population by up to 42bpm. (so the range for a 65 year old is between 115-195!). With the distribution curve this formula only predicts well fro around 20% of the population.

the TL:DR "it's useless for most folks"

Like so many physiological features there is a wide range of individual variation in HRmax, and it will respond to training and adaptation. Your heart is a muscle, and like most muscles responds to training load by growing. If you've only recently started training then it's likely that you will see a decline in your heart rate for the same level of exertion after a few months of structured training. There are also effects where you will get Hr drift during sustained activity and have an increased Hr for the same exertion level as time goes on. Finally there is exercise specific issues so a trained runner may be fine at 85% of their HRmax after a long run but would find a 10 minute bike session at the same HRmax% to be exhausting. This is related to the muscles in use reaching their lactic acid threshold and untrained muscles will do that a lot faster than trained muscles.

There are a couple of other "better" formula that show less decline with age would be HRmax = 208-0,7-age which would give you 160. That has an standard deviation of 7 to 11 bpm so you could be anywhere from 130 to 190 and still be in the "normal" population distribution. The study by Tanaka et al can be found here.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0735109700010548?via=ihub

The consequence of this formula vs 220-age is a significant increase in the age predicted Hr for older people as shown in the graph.



The advice would be to go with perceived exertion or the Borg scale and see how that aligns with your Hr during exercise.

https://www.cdc.gov/physicalactivity/basics/measuring/exertion.htm

Here maximum exertion which would be the same as Hrmax is 20 on the scale, the hardest most of us would ever experience is 19 on the scale (feel like puking after a minute at this level!), and resting is 6. A gentle walk would be around 7,5, a light jog around 11, running around 13 and so on. If you could talk in short sentences then you'd be around 14-16, although the perception and reaction to exertion is again individual. This is a sustainable level, once you start getting to 17/18 on the scale you'll feel like you really have to push yourself to continue, so is where most HIT is aiming to get you towards.

If you really want to know there are a couple of protocols that can help you identify where your Hr max is. I'd consult a doctor before attempting any of these. What is perhaps more indicative of cardiovascular fitness is your recovery rate, that is how quickly your heart rate drops in the first minute or two after exercise, the faster the better.

Freischuetz

there is no formula to calculate the max HR. i am 44 yo and my max HR is 208!

Machka9

Vladimirnapkin wrote: »

Oh, and I regularly hit heart rates above my predicted max.

Yep, me too.