Garmin users - do you get unusually high HR readings?

Pebble321

Hi all, I'm loving my Garmin Forerunner 405 - it seems very accurate for distance, pace etc, but I'm just not sure about the heart rate readings. It has a chest strap and I notifies me that it is picking up the chest strap so I know it's communicating.

The odd thing is that I have some really high readings - 228 and 230 are the highest so far, but I've also spotted a 211, 217, 218, 204 etc. If it was just once I would assume it's a glitch but these are often enough now to make me wonder.

I've had a look at the records online and the high readings always seem to come at about the 5 min mark and then it settles back to a more reasonable range for the rest of the run.

Does anyone have any ideas about why this might be occuring? I tend to think that it is the technology and not me - I've seen my doctor when I started training for a half marathon and he has checked my heart and everything else - and told me that all my results were so average and typical that they were boring!

itsmedicinalbacon

I used one a couple of years ago. It showed I had a heart rate much too high when I ran. It upset me every time the alarm went off and started to screw up my pace and such. I took it back to the store. I will admit I dont know much about them-maybe there is someway to adjust the settings?

Moriarty_697

My HR normally runs high so I occasionally get the opposite - it drops to an unrealistically low number and stays until I move the strap around. It's gotten better over time. My first few runs, I wound up taking my own pulse at intervals just to see how accurate it was.

My old Polar HRM used to do on very rare occasions.

When I find an HRM acting up while on a run, I find it sometimes helps to readjust the contacts - pull them away from the skin and then position them again.

what923

Ditto some of Moriarty...Make sure you add some water/wet the contact when you first put it on and try to have it up under your bra for the best position. Every once in a while I get a weird day where it just seems not to be reading right. After adjusting maybe try stopping the watch and resetting to start over. Sometimes a new read will clear it up. For safety you could just try to take your own pulse when it does that to see where you are at. I know running and trying to hold your pulse and count is not easy but it should get you close enough to know you're not at 200+. In fact I'm not sure someone's heart rate could go that high without some complications. Even at full throttle sprinting I don't think I've seen mine peak above 175. If your heart was really at 220 I don't think you would still be running. So try a few adjustments and if it's a regular occurrence then I would trade it in. Mine is only a year old and I find sometimes it doesn't shut down properly and over the winter it took forever to link to the satellites. For the price we pay- I need it to operate properly for a long time.

j_courter

mine spiked really high the other day while running. it wasn't on a hill or anything, so i asked my husband about it... he said if you accidentally touch or bump the monitor, or adjust it in any way it can affect the heart rate sensor.... hope this is the case. i can't imagine a heart rate really spiking like that, especially not 5 minutes into a run.