Can someone explain heart rate monitors to me please?

vonnywaft
vonnywaft Posts: 182
edited October 6 in Fitness and Exercise
How do they work? What can they tell me? Can they work out my BMR? Should I get one? which one? Why should I get one?

Replies

  • jsteffen80
    jsteffen80 Posts: 136
    They read your heart rate, and through calculations can figure out an approximation of how many calories you are burning based on your age/weight.

    Short of thousands of dollars of equipment, they are great for telling you how many calories you burn in a given time.

    You generally only wear them when you are working out.

    You should get one if you work out and want to know how many calories you are burning during your workouts.
  • mc322011
    mc322011 Posts: 36 Member
    I would go for polar this is the one I have and I love it! I got the FT4 version. It really give youa good idea of how many calories you are burning in a given time! for In my opinion it's a necessity to training!
  • dad106
    dad106 Posts: 4,868 Member
    They read your heart rate, and through calculations can figure out an approximation of how many calories you are burning based on your age/weight.

    Short of thousands of dollars of equipment, they are great for telling you how many calories you burn in a given time.

    You generally only wear them when you are working out.

    You should get one if you work out and want to know how many calories you are burning during your workouts.

    Only some do age and weight.. a good one should ask for all info.. age, weight, height, gender.

    Besides that tidbit, the rest of what this poster said is correct.

    Polar is the best brand... FT4 or FT7 is the most popular.
  • jsteffen80
    jsteffen80 Posts: 136
    a good one should ask for all info.. age, weight, height, gender.
    I knew I was missing a few, thanks.
  • rkr22401
    rkr22401 Posts: 216 Member
    I use the Polar FT60. You input age, weight, height, gender, and max heart rate. The watch does a resting fitness test (similar to VO2 max) based on this info and your resting heart rate and heart rate variability. It uses this info to estimate calories burned during your workout. It is much more accurate/personalized than a standard table or a treadmill computer.

    Mine also tells you how much of that burn was fat versus carbs. If you tell it your goals (weight loss, fitness improvement, run a marathon, etc.) it will create a workout program for you. It breaks the range of your heart rate into three zones and tells you which zone you are in and how long to workout in each zone. Mine will also measure my state of fatigue (if I so choose) and lower my desired heart rate accordingly.

    The watch syncs with the polar training website and stores all your workout data. The watch itself will store 100 workouts. It will tell you when you are ready for more training, when to avoid heavy training, and when to take a break based on your training load. This is good for preventing injury. Based on feedback from my body, I can tell you it is very accurate in this regard.
  • vonnywaft
    vonnywaft Posts: 182
    Hmmm! thanks. I suppose I was wondering about getting one because I'm a bit unusual and don't fit the standard measures due to being a double amputee, but if it's going to base it's calculations on height and weight it's still going to be massively reliant on guesswork. i know some other amputees through basketball that take training a bit more seriously than I do, so I might ask them how they calculate things. Don't want to spend a load of money for it to be a bit useless.
  • myofibril
    myofibril Posts: 4,500 Member
    Please see the link below:

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/397297-tell-me-about-heart-rate-monitors-hrms

    This is one of many useful posts in the MFP Unofficial FAQ group. Lots of great info there...
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