confused on heart rate

Have no fear. What you really want in to burn calories. The whole fat burning zone thing is a myth. Google "fat burning zone myth" and you will find an abundance of articles about it. Here is one http://www.active.com/triathlon/Articles/The-Myth-of-the-Fat-burning-Zone.htm

Check this out to find your target heart rate for exercising.....

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/target-heart-rate/SM00083

I've read that your fat burning heart rate zone is somewhere between 60-70% of your maximum heart rate.

So, I guess that number would vary for each of us.

Subtracting your age from 220 should roughly give you your maximum heart rate.

Hope this helps...

This might get long, but hopefully helps.

Losing weight (and therefore fat from our bodies) require us to burn calories. The critical issue is to exercise LONG ENOUGH to achieve a decent calorie deficit. Here's where the "fat burning" thing can be confusing. At lower intensities of exercise you are using "fat" as a preferred fuel source, and at very high intensities you are using "carbohydrate/glycogen" as the preferred source. But they are never just one or the other, just more so of one than the other depending on the intensity. There are pros and cons to this!

So....the theory of fat burning is.... lower intensity exercise utilizes fat for fuel more, HOWEVER, at lower intensities you are expending LESS calories per minute (that's the con), BUT you can do it for longer (that's the pro). But the bottom line of losing weight (and hence fat from our bodies) is to EXPEND more calories than we ingest and need.

The reason the "fat burning zone" phrase took off years ago (and sadly is still thrown around) is because it was meant to entice people to get off the couch and develop that base, instead of going from being sedentary to short high intensity bouts of exercise and giving up because it's too hard (or they get injured or frustrated).

If you're just starting a workout routine, building some cardio fitness (an endurance base that you can build on) is important. That can only be done by gradually building longer workouts, like starting w/30 min, then adding until you can get to non-stop (at whatever you're doing) for an hour. Once you have that base established you can throw in 1-2 high intensity shorter workouts in the week that use burn the same amount (and possibly more) calories than the longer ones.

My practical suggestion though on heart rate and exercise is, to use the age predicted max formula as a starting point only (220-age multiplied by % intensity), BUT also use your perceived exertion. The formula isn't very accurate (in fact it can be as much as 20 beats +/- incorrect). If you find once you're going along at your age predicted 75-80% heartrate and it's either causing you to be breathless OR feels like just a warm-up, then the formula is off for you. Instead work to a perceived effort of somewhat hard to hard (but not out of breath) and note what heart rate that gives you and that should be your 75-80%. Just adjust your percentages from there.

Hope that helps!