Heart Rate Tracking with Myzone®

Categories
Accurately measure exercise intensity
Achieve fitness or performance results
Most often, we are not exercising at an intensity sufficient enough to produce weight loss, enhance cardiovascular capacity or simply enhance our ability to recover from activity (a true sign of fitness). Using Myzone® can guide you to understand if you are exercising in the healthy zones according to what goal you are trying to achieve. Blue and green (light to moderate) zones are geared towards improving overall health and fitness. Yellow and red (high to maximum) zones, on the other hand, are helpful for performance gains or enhanced fitness results through higher intensity training periods. Recovery from these types of work phases is necessary to incorporate into the same workout session by returning to the blue zone between the high intensity training periods.

Why are the different Myzone® training zones important?
- Improvement of blood pressure management
- Increase healthy HDL cholesterol
- Advancement of cardiovascular functions
- Lower triglycerides
- Decrease risk for heart disease and stroke
The benefits of HIIT are shown to be:
- Improvement of aerobic and anaerobic fitness (“increase cardiovascular capacity”)
- Decrease in blood pressure
- Increase in insulin sensitivity
- Enhance cholesterol profiles
- Shred abdominal fat and body weight while maintaining muscle
- 30 seconds “sprint” or very hard effort /90 seconds-4 minutes active recovery. Repeat for approximately 10-20 minutes.
- 1 minute hard effort /1 minute active recovery. Repeat for 10-20 minutes.
- 3 minutes moderately hard effort /2-4 minutes active recovery. Repeat for 15-30 minutes.
- “Interval” programs on cardio equipment
How does Myzone® calculate my max heart rate and thus, training zones?
Heart rate tracking is important and beneficial for all fitness levels and forms of exercise. There are a wide variety of effective heart rate trackers on the market today that come in chest straps or watch form including Polar , Fitbit , Garmin or Wahoo . Because various factors play into how your body perceives the frequency, duration and intensity of your workouts, it is helpful to physically track your workouts with a heart rate tracking device. By providing objective measurements of how hard your body is working, heart rate tracking can greatly help you meet even your highest of fitness goals by improving the way you go about exercising.
For more information about Cooper Fitness Center or to schedule a session with a Professional Fitness Trainer , visit cooperfitnesscenter.com or call 972.233.4832 .
Article provided by Mary Edwards, MS , Cooper Fitness Center Director of Fitness and Professional Fitness Trainer.