Why Is Recovery Heart Rate Important
Your heart rate recovery shows how well your heart is working and can help predict future heart issues. So, its an important number for your provider to measure when you have an exercise stress test. They may measure your HRR to:
- Check your heart function.
- Determine your mortality risk.
- See how certain treatments are working.
An abnormal HRR could be a sign that your autonomic nervous system isnt working as it should. Your autonomic nervous system manages your heart rate and helps it return to normal after you exercise. This is the part of your nervous system that controls your involuntary movements . Scientists continue to study how problems with your autonomic nervous system impact your risk for heart disease.
For now, we know that people who have a low HRR are more likely to have conditions like:
A Higher Resting Heart Rate Can Be Concerning
Several studies have confirmed that the higher your resting heart rate, the greater your risk of death. Most of this risk is due to heart disease, but other causes of death also contribute to the risk. One study showed that a RHR of more than 90 beats per minute was associated with higher heart disease death rates .
How To Measure Hrr
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What Is Heart Rate Recovery And Why Is It Important
Heart rate recovery measures how much your heart rate decreases immediately after exercise. Like heart rate variability, heart rate recovery offers a look at your heart health by how fast it responds to the autonomic nervous system.
MedPage Today explains HRR like this:
Measures of that activity reflect the balance between the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system and have been shown to be powerful predictors of mortality.
Abnormally low HRR was found as a predictor of individuals being twice as likely to die within six years in one of the most cited studies referenced over 1,000 times from Cole, Blackstone, Pashkow, Snader, and Lauer.
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Recovery Heart Rate Zone
Your heart rate recovery zone indicates how exercise affects your heart. Whether you are an exercise newbie or a seasoned athlete, it is helpful to know how long it takes your heart to recover from exercise and return to its resting rhythm. You can check it yourself by recording your heart rate while at rest and after exercise.
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What Makes A Difference In Heart Rate Recovery Time After A Workout
Faster heart rate recovery times after a workout indicate you are healthy and fit. You are fully recovered when your heart rate returns to its pre-exercise heart rate, but how quickly your heart rate falls in the first minute after you stop exercising is by far the most important post-workout heart rate measurement. You can improve your recovery heart rate and recovery time by improving your fitness, exercising less intensely and improving your post-workout routine.
Q: What Is A Recovery Heart Rate
A: This is the heart rate your body will drop to after two minutes, after stopping an exercise session. For instance you exercised for 30 minutes and your heart rate was at 155. Two minutes after you stopped exercising, your heart rate then decreased to 95. This recovery heart rate measure helps to evaluate your overall heart fitness level. Use this measurement to compare between exercise sessions.
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What Is A Good 1
What is an excellent 1-minute heart rate recovery indicator for you will depend on your age, fitness level, and overall physical health. The heart rate recovery indicator usually decreases with age and is higher in elite athletes. If your heart rate recovery is lower than 12 bpm, you should seek help from a medical professional.
How To Improve Your Recovery Heart Rate
If your recovery heart rate is not as low as you’d like it to be, there are a few things you can do. First, you can simply wait a few days. If you are especially tired, if you’d had caffeine during the day or if you are not properly hydrated, your heart rate might be higher than normal.
But if you notice that your post-exercise heart rate is typically higher, you may want to talk to your doctor. In many cases, your doctor may review your health history or recommend a further investigation to see why your heart rate is high. But your doctor may also simply recommend that you improve your level of fitness to train your heart to recover more effectively.
The best way to begin if you’ve been sedentary is to begin an easy program of exercise. Many new exercisers are surprised to find out that they don’t have to do hard-core training to see real results. In fact, easy exercise can even benefit trained exercisers.
The key is to include easy exercise in a comprehensive program of movement that ultimately includes moderate and vigorous activity as well. If you measure your heart rate along the way, you will always know that you are training at the right intensity level.
Recently, Polar a leader in wearable sports and fitness technology released research data showing that athletes who use a heart rate-based training program were able to increase their level of fitness without increasing the volume of exercise. If you don’t have endless hours to exercise, that’s good news.
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How Do I Accurately Measure My Heart Rate
To accurately measure your heart rate, you should:
How Do We Measure Fitness
Your resting heart rate is best measured when your body is completely at rest, so ideally this will be in the moments you first wake up. If you are using a heart rate watch, this can be as simple as checking the reading from your watch.
To measure your heart rate without any additional tools your two easiest pulse points are the neck and wrist. Place your Index and third finger on your neck, just left of your windpipe. To check your pulse at your wrist, place two fingers between the bone and the tendon over your radial artery which is located on the thumb side of your wrist. To take your reading, count the number of beats in 15 seconds and times this by 4, whilst you can count for the full 60 seconds youre more likely to stay accurate for a shorter amount of time.
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MENS RESTING HEART RATE CHART |
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WOMENS RESTING HEART RATE CHART |
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The above are guidelines and if your resting heart rate causes concern, it may be worth consulting a GP.
Typically, when it comes to studying resting heart rate and fitness, a lower resting heart rate signifies a higher level of health as seen above. As cardiovascular fitness improves, the muscles in the heart wall thicken and the heart pumps more blood with each beat, increasing its efficiency.
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The Recovery Heart Rate Time After Cardio Exercise
Your heart’s ability to return to normal levels after physical activity is a good indicator of fitness. A healthy heart will recover quickly in the first three minutes after stopping exercise.
Being out of shape or having certain health conditions can result in a higher heart rate after exercise. You can improve your recovery heart rate by becoming fitter. If a health condition is to blame, ask your doctor for her recommendation.
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Heart Rate Recovery Can Also Be A Pretty Good Measure Of Fitness And Performance
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The average one-minute heart rate recovery to be: 23 beats per minute
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Two-minute heart rate recovery to be: 58 beats per minute
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Three-minute heart rate recovery to be: 82 beats per minute.
For those of us not considered elite athletes , a 2014 study that looked at physically active men and found:
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The average one-minute heart rate recovery to be: 15 beats per minute
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Three-minute heart rate recovery to be: 64 beats per minute.
In general, its a good idea to think the faster the heart rate recovery, the better the fitness.
And just like heart rate can be affected by many things, hour to hour, day to day so too can heart rate recovery. One measurement can be helpful, but its multiple measurements over time that give the best info.
Heart rate recovery is one of the many things Karen and I can take a look at when working with you to ensure youre on the right track to achieve your recovery and fitness goals.
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Do you have an injury that has kept you from being as fit as youd like?
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Are you someone who has dealt with medical issues and want to make sure youre doing everything you can to be as healthy as you can be?
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Or are you just looking to improve your strength and conditioning?
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What Is A Good Heart Rate Recovery Time
A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine of nearly 2500 adults over a 6-year time frame observed that the median value for heart rate recovery was 17 beats per minute, with a range from the 25th to the 75th percentile of 12 to 23 beats per minute. However, the average age of the participants was also 57 years old, and HRR has been found to .
Another study from 2015 tested 274 elite male athletes. Those over the age of 18 had an average 1-minute HRR of 29.5, compared to 22.4 for subjects under 18.
One thing to note is that not only does heart rate recovery vary from person to person, it can also fluctuate for you from day to day. A 2016 case study entitled The Science and Application of Heart Rate Recovery examined the HRR of runners post-workout in relation to their daily WHOOP recovery . Across the board, the athletes had faster heart rate recovery times on days when their WHOOP recoveries were higher.
How Is Heart Rate Recovery Calculated
The formula for heart rate recovery is quite simple:
HR recovery = HR max HR after one minute,
where:
- HR recovery Heart rate recovery
- HR max Maximum heart rate at the very end of your physical activity in beats per minute and
- HR after one minute Heart rate after resting for one minute in bpm.
For instance, if your maximum heart rate at the end of your exercise is 175 bpm, and after one minute, it goes down to 156 bpm, your heart rate recovery index is 175 156 = 19.
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Complete Your Fitness Activity
The goal in this step is to increase your heart rate, so choose an activity thats going to get your heart pumping. Go for a brisk walk or run around the block, jump rope, use an elliptical trainer, or do any activity that will increase your heart rate. While youre exercising, check your heart rate frequently. Youre aiming to hit your target heart rate from the chart above. Once your heartbeat is within the target range, stop exercising and write down two measurements:
1. Your heart rate immediately after stopping
2. Your heart rate 2 minutes later
Thats Where Rest And Recovery Come In
When you recover, you regain, restore, or recuperate what youve lost. And you return to your baseline state of wellbeing, health, and performance.
For example, recovery could involve:
- Replacing the fluids you sweated out during exercise, or the glucose that you used up to power your muscles.
- Getting your immune system back to full strength after youve been sick.
- Something intangible, such as feeling mentally or spiritually restored after a vacation.
Stress and recovery go together like shoes and socks, Batman and Robin, and rocks and hard places. Thats because recovery is part of the process that helps you get stronger, faster, better, and more resilient, as this chart shows.
Lets take a closer look at the chart above, using an intense workout as an example of a stressor.
You start in homeostasis, or your baseline. This is your bodys status quo.
Then, you encounter a stressor that disrupts your homeostasis. In this case, its that intense workout. Your breathing rate, heart rate, energy needs, and body temperature all increase.
Next, you enter an alarm phase where you deal with the disruption. During this phase, your performance temporarily gets worse.
Now you enter the recovery phase. As long as you replenish fluids and nutrients and dont keep adding additional stressors your body cant handle, youll recover and rebuild any damaged tissues over the next several days. During this process, you get stronger and more resilient.
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Why Is My Heart Rate Recovery So Low
If you measure and track your HRR over time, you may find that your recovery is sometimes a little wonky.That could be because of acute things that can screw it up periods of long fasting, lack of sleep, huge amounts of psychological stress, Nelson says. These can cause an erosion from what your normal HRR should be.
Caffeine Intake
Ina 2017 study, young men who were given caffeine before exercise had a delayed response by their parasympathetic nervous system aka squishier brakes than when they didnt have the caffeine.
Dehydration
In a 2015 study, HRR was shown to be decreased after exercise in young wrestlers who were dehydrated. Hydration status can be impacted not just by how much water you drink, Viada says, but by other substances and medications youre taking including caffeine and certain blood pressure-lowering medications like beta-blockers and diuretics.
Poor Sleep
After just a single night of poor sleep, security guards ina 2015 study saw their one-minute HRR slip from an average of 36 BPM to 31 BPM after a bout of intense exercise.
High Temperatures
If youve ever exercised on a really hot day, you may have noticed that your heart rate stays elevated for longer after youve done something intense.
How To Improve Your Heart Rate Recovery
Verywell / Julie Bang
Now that you understand heart rate recovery, you may be wondering how to improve it. First, make sure you consider the other factors that may impact your heart rate recovery, like not getting enough sleep, caffeine intake, and dehydration.
When tracking changes in your heart rate recovery, these factors could change how accurate the numbers are. The most important factor for improving your recovering heart rate is physical activity.
If you feel overwhelmed by the thought of exercising more and increasing your activity, know that it doesnt have to be a big change. Even small changes in exercise will help your fitness levels. The focus should be on starting where you are instead of thinking it needs to be an unrealistic goal.
If youre currently sedentary, start by adding one or two short walks daily. Then slowly increase your time spent moving. Even activities like vacuuming, sweeping, or cutting grass with a push mower count as part of your daily activity.
Here are some other tips to increase your physical activity and fitness levels:
- Take the stairs.
- Park farther away from the door.
- Increase workouts slowly.
- Sign up for group fitness classes.
- Hire a personal trainer.
- Meet a friend for a walk.
- Garden or do yard work.
- Clean the house.
- Test different types of workouts.
Contact your healthcare provider if you have any concerns about your heart rate during and after exercise.
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Find Your Target Heart Rate
Use the chart below to find the target heart rate for your age group.
- 20-29 years old: 120-160 beats/ minute
- 30-39 years old: 114-152 beats/ minute
- 40-49 years old: 108-144 beats/ minute
- 50-59 years old: 102-136 beats/ minute
- 60-69 years old: 96-128 beats/ minute
- 70-79 years old: 90-120 beats/ minute
- 80-89 years old: 84-112 beats/ minute
- 90-99 years old: 78-104 beats/ minute
- 100 years old or older: 72-96 beats/ minute
*Target heart rates are based on 60%-80% of estimated maximum heart rates .
Now, practice finding your pulse point and calculating your heart rate:
Place one or two fingertips on the opposite wrist, just below the base of your thumb. Count the number of heartbeats you feel in 10 seconds. Multiply that number by 6 to get your heart rate per minute.
Better yet! Use the Argus app and your can achieve this reading on your phone!