A stop watch tells you how fast you’re running. It works in terms of distance per unit time, i.e. miles per hour, meters per second, or yards per minute. A heart rate monitor tells you how hard you’re working. It works in terms of heart beats per minute.
For a young athlete, a stop watch is very important. For a senior athlete however, a heart rate monitor is vastly more important than a stop watch.
Pam: There are a variety of heart rate monitors on the market, but I wear a Fitbit. It gives me all kinds of valuable feedback including how many steps I take in a day (yes, it’s a pedometer), to how many miles I ran during a particular workout.
But most importantly it serves as a constant heart rate monitor. For example, when I’m reading a book in the evening it gives me my resting heart rate, which is currently around 60 beats per minute. When I’m running long my heart rates gets up around 120 beats per minute and it stays there throughout the run.
But when Rick and I are sprinting my heart rate varies from a high of around 160 beats per minute in the midst of a sprint, and it goes back down to around 120 beats per minute when we’re walking in between sprints to recover. This kind of variation is typical of all high intensity interval workouts.
For a senior athlete Rick and I agree that (aside from appropriate footwear which we’ll address at a later date) a heart rate monitor is probably the most important piece of equipment you can get your hands on. And yes I do love my Fit-Bit.
Next Post: Chronological VS Physiological Aging
No comments:
Post a Comment