The great debate between
whether to use heart rate monitors to train or not has been going on for many
years. Some say that heart rate monitors are the only way to truly train, while
others think that heart rate monitors are a waste of time, effort, and money.
Here are some benefits and drawbacks to using a heart rate monitor.
The Hard Truth
Heart rate monitors record
you heart in every step of the way. This leads to hard data on your heart’s
performance during training, recovery, and racing. Taking this hard data, you
can plan for where you need to improve during your races by seeing exactly
where your heart needs time to recover and where you need to speed up.
Knowing
exactly what your heart rate looks like during the race will lead to focusing
on your pace and better training plans.
Pacing
It may seem tedious, but
recording your heart rate data with the finishing times of the legs in your
races will improve your knowledge of your pacing. While training, record your
heart rate for all stages of your workout. After recording your data you can
identify what your heart rate looks like at your normal pace. This comes in
handy on race day when you feel like you are going to slow and need to speed
up. Look at your heart monitor. Is your heart rate the same as in training or
do you need to speed up or slow down? If your heart is already beating out of
control, then you should relax so you still have energy at the end of the race.
If your heart rate is too low, speed up so you can finish with a better time.
The Recovery Period
A little counterintuitive
sounding, but wearing a heart rate monitor and recording the data from it
during your recovery will help you figure out how long it takes your heart to
recover. Measure your resting heart rate first thing when you wake up after a
day of hard training and a day after easy training. If your heart rate spikes
on any of these days, you may need to recover for longer. This tells you that
your body is overworked and to get the benefits from training, your body might
need a different plan to recover. Replenishing your body fully before extreme
workouts or training days will help you build more muscle and excel in your
time.
Making a Plan
People who train with heart
rate monitors know exactly what their body is telling them and therefore they
are able to make a training plan to suit their body’s needs, while reaping the benefits on race
day. Regardless of what race a person who trains with a heart rate monitor is
doing, their scheduled plan allows them to train to the best of their body’s
ability.
Conversely, people who have
a plan without data don’t know exactly what their training schedule is
improving or lacking; it’s all about feeling. Where the freedom is there without
measuring heart rates, the facts are not. Having a plan based on heart rates
can increase the consistency of improving your race results without stressing
on what went wrong during the race. With a heart monitor you know at what point
your pace or strategy needs improvement, which helps you tweak your plan.
Drawbacks
As with any technology,
there are some drawbacks to racing with heart monitors. If you just want to
have fun racing, heart monitor training is probably not for you. Recording
heart monitor data is a discipline and if you are only there to have fun, then
this might take the fun out of it for you.
There are many factors that
may mess with the monitor itself or environmental factors that naturally change
your heart rate. Are you not getting enough sleep? Are you dehydrated? Is it
hotter today than it was yesterday? Is there extra pressure from work or home
life? Are you addicted to coffee? I know I am. Is your gear made out of
synthetic fabrics? If there is a possibility of yes from these questions then
there is also a possibility that you will get a faulty reading from your heart
rate monitor. They are not infallible and they can be finicky which means that
some data will be skewed from them.
Heart Rate Versus Lactate
Levels
This is the biggest argument
against heart monitor training in my opinion. The lactate levels in your blood
determine how well your body responds to your training program. Although there
are some fancy graphs and equations to figure that out based on your heart rate,
they are only averages and not based on you and your body. This means that the
training zone you think you fit best into for the particular leg of the race
you are on, may not be the one that your body actually fits best into.
You Decide
I recommend trying to train
with a heart rate monitor plan to see if it works for you. You never know if
you don’t try. If you decide that heart rate monitoring is just not your thing,
record your race leg times so you can know which portion of the race you excel
at and which portion may need a little more attention.
Beep Beep Happy Monitoring!
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