We often hear about normal heart rates and target heart rates when we start looking into ways to incorporate exercise into our routine. Let’s review just what a normal heart rate and a target heart rate actually are. A little help from news-medical.net gives us some basic explanations:
Your heart rate is the number of heartbeats per unit of time. Usually, heart rate is expressed as beats per minute (BPM). The heart beats to supply oxygenated clean blood from the left ventricle to the blood vessels of the body via the aorta.
Your body’s need for oxygen changes in certain situations like when you exercise or sleep, so your heart rate also changes. At each beat your heart pumps blood into the blood vessels. As the blood flows into the blood vessels, the blood vessels expand and this is felt as a pulse.
By feeling your pulse, you can measure your heart rate. The easiest places to find your pulse include:
• Temporal artery by the sides of the forehead.
• Facial artery at the angle of the jaws.
• Carotid artery in the neck.
• Radial artery at the wrist.
A normal heart rate is usually between 70 to 90 beats per minute. Athletes have a lower basal heart rate while stress, exercise and anxiety can often raise a heart rate. A target heart rate is the desired rate you want to achieve during aerobic exercise. It is one that helps your heart and lungs receive maximum benefits from an exercise session. It can differ between individuals based on their age, sex, and athletic capabilities.
Usually, your target heart rate zone is between 50 and 85 percent of your maximum heart rate or the maximum number of times your heart should beat in a minute without dangerously overexerting yourself. Your target zone can tell you what heart rate to aim for during a workout.
The point at which your body switches from using oxygen as its primary source of energy to using stored sugar is referred to as your anaerobic threshold. When you’re in poor physical shape, your body isn’t very efficient at taking in oxygen, and you hit your anaerobic threshold while exercising at relatively low levels of exercise. As you become more fit, you’re able to go farther and faster, yet still supply oxygen to your muscles.
One method to determine your target heart rate for aerobic activities such as running or walking is for men to subtract their age from 220, and for women to subtract their age from 226. Remember that this formula is only an estimate. Your true max may be as many as 15 beats higher or lower. Once you subtract your age, you multiply by .50 to find the low end and .85 to find the high end. If your pulse is racing in the high end after you exercise, you know you should slow down.
To find out what your actual target heart rate should be, check with your health care professional. It never hurts to give your heart a checkup.
