What Are Heart Rate Monitors?

Both seasoned fitness enthusiasts and novice athletes can benefit from the use of a heart rate monitor. A heart rate monitor can be a crucial tool in helping you to optimize your workouts for weight loss, improvements in athletic performance, and cardiovascular health. Let’s take a look at how heart rate monitors work for insight into how they can help you get the most out of your training.

Heart Monitor Basics

Most heart rate monitors are comprised of a chest strap which carries a transmitter and a watch-like receiver worn on the wrist. As your heart beats, its rhythmic contraction is driven by an electrical charge that travels across the muscle. The same electrical charge is also conducted through the skin, allowing the transmitter portion of the heart rate monitor to detect and measure the activity of the heart. By checking the monitor on his or her wrist receiver, the wearer knows when to alter the intensity of his or her athletic activity to achieve desired results.

Calculating Your Target Heart Rate

Calculating your target heart rate requires that you determine your maximum heart rate as a baseline. The most accurate method for obtaining this information is to measure your heart rate during peak physical exertion. You can do this on your own, or, for the best results, have a personal trainer or medical professional monitor your heart rate while you’re exercising.

Another popular method for calculating your maximum heart rate is to subtract your age from 220. The resulting number is the maximum heart rate for most people your age. For example, a 30 year old man would subtract 30 from 220, leaving him with 190. This means that for most 30 year old men, their maximum heart rate is 190. Using this number, he can now determine his target heart rate for cardiovascular conditioning or fat burning.

Heart Rate Monitors For Weight Loss & Optimized Cardiovascular Conditioning

Reasons for beginning a fitness regimen can vary widely from person to person. Did you know that your personal fitness goal should determine your target heart rate? If your fitness goal is simply to strengthen your cardiovascular system, recent studies indicate that you should maintain a level of exertion that keeps your heart rate at 75%-88% of its maximum. Surprisingly, if your goal is fat loss, you should shoot for a lower target of 65%-75% of your maximum heart rate. Doing so triggers activity in muscle fibers which prefer fat as fuel, and which allow you to work out for a more sustained duration.

It can be challenging to carve out time for fitness when you have a very full schedule. Most of us can agree that workout time is a precious commodity. That’s why it’s so important to use target heart rate training and a reliable heart rate monitor to ensure that your time in the gym is used as wisely as possible. When it comes to investing in fitness, a little knowledge and a high quality heart monitor result maximum rewards.