Polar FT7 vs FT4 and Target Heart Rate

kimmiess1978

I got the Polar FT7 and I cannot stand it. It says I go into fitness at like 126, which I should not go into fitness until about 147ish. The zones are messed up in accordance to where my target heart rate for fat burning is. I tried increasing the max heart rate, but that didnt help any. Today however I ended up accidentally stopping the recording in my workout, so I started recording a new one. That time the zones were more accurate bc I was already warmed up.

So when I first got the FT7 I called Polar and they said that you cannot customize this watch, but they said you can customize the upper and lower limits on the zones on the FT4. Can anyone speak to that? Should I just downgrade?

Im debating about getting the FT4 instead since you can customize it more. What are your thoughts? Are there some tricks with the FT7 that I dont know about? Thanks

kimmiess1978

Anyone?

aleggett321

Why do you need the the zones on your HRM? And why do you not want to be in the fitness zone? You can figure out your target zones and keep your heart rate there. It doesn't seem worth buying another monitor to me to do what you can do in your head. Figure your max HR (220 minus your age) and decide what percentage of that you want to aim for.

YorriaRaine

I have a ft7 and I don't even pay attention to the zones, I just pay attention to what my heart rate is atm and whether or not I'm pushing myself too hard, or not hard enough. I"m nearly always in the "fitness" zone. However, the zones it is giving you are correct according to most websites.

One thing you gotta remember is that most websites give you several different zones, while the ft7 has two. It has fat burning, and then fitness. Once you leave fat burning your in fitness by the ft7 standards. Some websites have in-between stages laid out for you.