Have you ever got a runners high or felt amazing after some cardio class? I used to get it all the time when I taught group fitness. We’d check our heart rate a few times through the workout for those that cannot tell how intense they’re working out. The reason we measured our heart rate is because there is a specific range each of us should be in during cardio exercise. If you’re below the range, you’re kind of wasting your time and if you’re above your range, that’s not good either.
The following blog is all about that range called your target heart rate zone. I include real stories, what science says, and at the end share a few things going on that I’m super proud about. If you find any value in my content after reading, I’d be honored if you’d share it with someone you really care about.
#1 Know What is Target Heart Rate and Why It Matters⠀
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Target heart rate or, THR, is super important for cardio exercise safety and effectiveness.⠀There is a range scientists in exercise research have found to be effective for most of us. We’ll get into the calculations in the next point.⠀
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If you don’t workout hard enough, you’re wasting your time. If you workout too hard, you could be causing damage to your heart muscles. Yikes 😱
I first learned about it my senior year in high school. I was taking my first high school class of PE. I skipped PE because I was involved in music and after school dance/show choir. I had to get 3 semesters of PE done in 2 semesters so I chose aerobics (always been a fan) and NJROTC.
I loved my aerobics class. I took it with my two besties and most of the students in the class didn’t like to exercise so it was easy for me to rise to the top 😆. On walking days I’d ask if it was okay if I jogged. I felt like, if I have to pay for a gym membership one day and this is free, why not get the most out of it?
One day, our PE teacher said we’re going to the library for some health lessons on heart rate. She passed out some handouts on target heart rate and how to calculate it. We had the assignment to find our resting heart rate the next night. I really enjoyed learning about the body and that I had control of improving something as important as my heart.
In my family there is a long history of heart disease on both sides so if this was something in my control, I was SO open to doing something about it.
#2 Know How to Calculate Your Target Heart Rate Zone
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Exercise organizations change the percentages every few years but for most the target heart rate range is between 50-85% of your maximum heart rate (220-age- your resting heart rate). ⠀
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There are occasional outliers that don’t fit in the MHR boundaries (i.e. Tachycardia, or Bradycardia).: ⠀
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If this be the case for you, try this equation instead. Comment below with your range! Mine is 121-167.2 (33yr old resting 55bpm)
#3 Know What Technologies Are Accurate At Measuring Heart Rate ⠀
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Are treadmill heart rate monitors accurate at measuring your heart rate during exercise?
Unfortunately not…
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I had the pleasure of hearing from an Air Force exercise physiologist during my undergraduate experience.⠀
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He did his entire Masters Thesis on the accuracy of them vs. traditional heart rate monitors strapped to the chest.⠀
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He found they were way off a majority of the time…⠀
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So…. ⠀
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My advice to you is to either manually count for no more than 15 seconds during a pause in your workout, or invest in a traditional heart rate monitor device…⠀
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#4 Which THR Measuring Devices Are The Best?!⠀
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Depends on what your goals are. According to a 2018 poll from Techradar, these are the top pics.
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When it comes to accuracy of HR, they all are pretty accurate with the right conduction.⠀
When I was a health researcher with the Army and Air Force, we sprayed water on the heart rate monitor before the testing to get good conduction during the entire testing.⠀
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If you don’t sweat a lot during exercise, you might need to spray water on your skin where the HR monitor will be.⠀
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#5 The Move Happy Facilitator Program© Includes Workouts Specific To Your THR?
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Super excited & proud to share my 16-week program with you! It is something I actually facilitated to my former adult patients in a psychiatric hospital.⠀
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We ran the program 4 days a week and each week included a topic like how I share with you every week! ⠀
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All weekly topics were related to happiness from what I researched⠀
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I created a psychological questionnaire to measure happiness (simple 1-pager) & a fitness questionnaire to measure fitness so you and your participants can track progress throughout.⠀
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My patients improved for the most part in both areas consistently and spread news about the group around the hospital 💜 ⠀
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Each day includes:⠀
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Journaling 📓 (pre-designed questions I created)⠀
Group Discussion of the daily topic (a subtopic of the weekly)⠀
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Workouts 🏋️♀️ With Minimal Equipment ⠀
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I recreated the workouts via video example (demo not full) so you don’t have to be a fitness expert to run the program⠀
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I’m looking for program testers that are willing to give me a testimony to increase the trust factor (honest testimony of course). ⠀
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To the first ✌️ that email me a receipt of order, I’m sending you some swag once you’ve had a chance to try the program out and give me an honest review.⠀To Order Go Here.
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Move Happy® Updates
The Move Happy Podcast has 200 listens yay! 😁 Keep sharing about it with people that need motivation to keep a positive mindset, build community and fitness tips on a budget.
The Move Happy® World Tour Experience planning is underway. We’ll be having live musicians, public speakers, medical trainings to improve the treatment of people with mental illness and complete life transformation at this event and future annual events. My vision is that anyone with depression or depressed states will come to this event, and be equipped with the knowledge to never think about ending their lives or causing self-harm again. It’s a pretty big vision and one that requires your support.
Donate to help the event be made possible here. Email me your information and donation amount to help me track for my future accountant 😂.
Erin Nicole Media® Is my social media agency where I teach my social media content strategy and help you outline your content for 12-months-5years depending on the size of your vision. I recently launched the company a few months ago after a conversation with Facebook encouraging me to share my efficiency system with others.
I had been spending about 30 hours a week coming up with my content, writing it out, posting it on the different platforms, and direct messaging people. I cut it down from that to about 4-6hrs a week including my blog writing. I decided I wanted to enjoy the experience while hustling and show others that its possible to enjoy the journey too.
I’m offering my next 90-minute workshop teaching you my efficiency system soon!
By the end of the workshop you’ll have your content outlined for at least 12-months, you’ll be introduced to best practices for the most popular social media platforms, and have a brief introduction to the power of hash tags (#). I am teaching the course online and will provide a recording to all participants to reference.
The workshop is $197 and 40% of proceeds can go towards the rental of the space for the world tour if you request. Otherwise, 30% will go to your local mental health organization and 10% will go towards your local chapter of Big Brothers and Big Sisters to help your youth. Email me to register for the next workshop here subject line “Social Media University Intensive Workshop Interest.” If you’d like a private 1:1 session at a separate time, I am offering that for only $397 and you get access to the group workshop. Make sure to email me a few time preferences for the 1:1 workshop and your time zone country to help me stay organized 😃.
Move Happy® Is Working on Getting Accreditation To Teach Courses In Hospitals To Medical Professionals. I’m SO excited about this one. Can you imagine if Move Happy Courses were available in every hospital in the world how many depressed people this could help? I’m on a mission to empower every life world wide (all 7+ billion) to focus on happiness and the possibilities of their future. I want to end depression world wide. It is a very very big goal but together we can do more right? If you’re a medical practitioner (doctor, psychologist, psychiatrist, psych nurse, social worker, etc) and you’re interested in hearing more about this, please email me and I’ll keep you in the loop as it gets closer to fruition.
So there it is. Target heart rate workouts are legit. Keep in mind your zone changes slightly every year so you’ll have to recalculate. If you’re not close by a device to measure your heart rate you can always do the palpation test for 15 seconds or less and multiply to get to 60 for your avg BPM. The other option is to do the talk test and make sure you can say a couple words but you’d rather not. That’s the best zone to be in. I hope to see you at the world tour experience next summer!
PS: Don’t forget to tell someone you love them today….
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