This Week's Exercise Tip

 

Target Heart Rate
 

Are you working out hard enough?  One of the most effective ways to assess this is to measure your target heart rate.  Target heart rate zone is the range between 60-80% of your maximum heart rate.  Working within’ this zone gives you the maximum health and fat-burning benefits from your cardiovascular activity.

Here is a quick way to figure out your target heart rate using the Karvonen formula:
(note: to figure out your resting heart rate, check your pulse for 1 minute when you are at total rest, ex. when you wake up without an alarm)

220 – your age = Max heart rate

MHR – RHR (resting heart rate) = HRR

HRR x (60-80%) = training range %

(training range %) + RHR = target training zone

Example:

220 – 30 = 190

190 – 65 = 125

125 x 70% = 87.5

87.5 + 65 = 152.5

The goal is to try to stay close to this heart rate during your cardio exercise.  The most effective way to measure this is by wearing a heart rate monitor or using the heart rate monitor on certain cardio machines.