doc says I have a low pulse rate

PutneyJoe

I went to get my Marmotte cert and the doc took my pulse and blood pressure.

She said my pulse was low (41) and sent me for a ECG.

2 weeks later I had that and she had a look at it and now she wants to see me again 'nothing to worry about but to discuss the bike ride'.

I think my pulse is low because I'm pretty fit at the moment - I've been doing a lot of exercise as training.
But of course now she's got me worried and imagining I can feel a 'tightness across the chest' etc. It was never there before, probably isn't there now.

I have no bad symptons, I feel great. Or I did before she got me worried.

Anyone else have similar pulse rates? Is it that abnormal for someone doing a lot of cycling?

thanks
Joe

jonginge

She probably doesn't see many fit people
Trained heartrates vary quite a lot but for someone gearing up for the marmotte I'd say 41 is not unexpected for a resting HR.
Get checked out if only for peace of mind. Tell your GP of Eddy Merckx (HR 33bpm), Indurain (28bpm) etc etc

nasahapley

I think you'll find lots of people who exercise on a regular basis have similarly low heart rates - mine will be in the low 40s as I'm typing this. In itself I wouldn't have thought a resting heart rate of 40 was any cause for concern for a fit chap such as yourself, but you've got to give what your doctor says much, much more weight than anything you get told on an internet forum!

squired

I wouldn't get worried about it. When I was doing a lot of cycling mine was around 42. At the moment it is around 48. The problem is that the average GP is used to seeing people all day who do no exercise, so a fit person is a bit of a shock.

PutneyJoe

thanks chaps that have re-assured me somewhat. Lets see what she says tonight...

parkaboy

There are some ailments that can produce a low heartrate, but you probably wouldn't be able to ride your bike, or increase it when you're riding and you'd feel pretty dreadful.

Being fit will lower your heartrate, because you heart is just a muscle it will respond and get more efficient like the rest of your body has.

Still it sounds like she's 'cured' it, because the next time you visit, the anxiety it's caused you will send it through the roof

PutneyJoe

Just got back from the doc.
Apparently the ECG showed that I have Heart Block. I've got to go to a cardiologist next for a better appraisal. But she said I can carry on training, as I have been with no symptons.

I found this online http://www.americanheart.org/presenter. ... ifier=4611
which seems to indicate it something that can come from training alot ...

popette

Hi Putney Joe,
Good luck with it - good that you're on the road to getting it all sorted.
I'm just going through something similar - strange readings on my HR monitor, seen Doc, seen Cardiologist and now awaiting treatment for Atrial Flutter. I'm going a bit slower at the moment and I can't wait for full training to resume again.
again, good luck - keep us updated on how you get on

liversedge

Indurain had a resting HR of 25. If you have a big heart a low HR is not unusual - more blood gets pumped for each beat. My resting HR went down to 43 last year when I was trained and sits at 50 now I'm a lazy get.

Was it the resting HR that she was measuring tho? Were you lying down, sitting or standing?

oldwelshman

liversedge wrote:

Indurain had a resting HR of 25. If you have a big heart a low HR is not unusual - more blood gets pumped for each beat. My resting HR went down to 43 last year when I was trained and sits at 50 now I'm a lazy get.

Was it the resting HR that she was measuring tho? Were you lying down, sitting or standing?

You sure it was 25? That seems excessively low to live!!
MOst top atheltes from 35 upwards as far as I know. 25 would have really low blood pressure.

oldwelshman

Ah ok, several sites state his RR was 28, still not quite 25

Quote from one site:
NOTE: An average heart weighs 300g (10.7 ozs.) and is about the size of a fist.
The average resting heart rate is 66/72 beats per minute (bpm). A well-trained endurance athlete is 40 bpm. The lowest on record is 28 bpm (Miguel Indurain, a Spanish cyclist).

biondino

Just checked mine - 51 - rather pleased with that! It was 57 a couple of months ago when I did a controlled HR test session.

liversedge

I wonder what the highest (healthy) MAX HR ever "measured" is?

Johnpwr

I have no idea how true or not, but I recall a conversation held on a podcast about low heart rates and the conversation indicated that resting Heart rates going down into the 20s can be dangerous because of blood viscosity and the amount of time between beats becoming large enough to be an issue.

This is another view on low heart rates : http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/news/article.asp?uan=1539

In general, if you are doing an endurance sport regularly, one of the aerobic efficiency gains is for your heart volume to increase, so more blood is pumped with each beat, hence when you aren't exercising, you need less beats to move the volume of blood necessary to stay alive

ut_och_cykla

Johnpwr wrote:

I have no idea how true or not, but I recall a conversation held on a podcast about low heart rates and the conversation indicated that resting Heart rates going down into the 20s can be dangerous because of blood viscosity and the amount of time between beats becoming large enough to be an issue.
SNIP)

Yes too low starts allowing clots to form I think. it was aproblem for my brother who had 180 bpm induced by borelia, was given drugs to slow him down, got down below 30 - panic in ward.....suspected blot clot etc.
guy next to him with bpm over 200 died tho' - od'd on speed was the rumour!

oldwelshman

Basically the human heart has a difinitive number of beats, cannot remember the average amount but basically the lwoer your rate, the longer your heart lasts

Mark Alexander

Ayrton Senna had a HR of 45.. so I'm as fit the legend? I doubt it. :?
Good luck.

fossyant

Don't get too worried what the GP said.....

I had a full BUPA checkup 12 months ago (when I wasn't as fit as I am now) and had my HR checked etc. a number of times, and stress tested on a bike (well might have been a stress test to an unfit person, but to a cyclist it was like pootling down the road)

Whilst wired up on the last monitor, the Doctor looked at the signals on the screen and said...."If i didn't know better, this looks like you are about to have a heart attack"......."Don't worry, you see this on people who are fit......my husband is the same"....

Don't get too worried !!!

pedylan

The medical profession (sort of understandably) don't see many fit people. My sister plays a lot of competitive sport and carries out a pretty intensive training regime - sport specific and gym based.

She got shin whacked at hockey and eventually needed some surgery under a general. Routine post op monitoring involves pulse rate (clothes peg thing on finger). When this registered at 38bpm the nurse called the crash team. My sister was understandably alarmed and had started to come round. When they told her why she was surrounded by medics she just said "but I play a lot of sport and train hard". They all pushed off looking a bit sheepish apparently. Her normal RHR is in the low 40's.

Mine is in the high 40's and I guess a lot of us on here will register these kind of values. Good luck with further investigations and have a great Marmotte.

ColinJ

My resting HR isn't particularly low at the moment beacuse I'm overweight and and not super-fit but the last time that I was slim and fit it dropped to 33-35 bpm. As I lay in bed at night I could feel my pulse go BUM-BUMP (Mississippi Mississip..) BUM-BUMP (Mississippi Mississip..) BUM-BUMP (Mississippi Mississip..). It was kind of relaxing and slightly scary at the same time :shock: .

I thought about getting one of those medical bracelets to record my normal HR so that medical personnel wouldn't get into a major flap if something happened to me.

andrewgturnbull

pedylan wrote:

The medical profession (sort of understandably) don't see many fit people. My sister plays a lot of competitive sport and carries out a pretty intensive training regime - sport specific and gym based.

She got shin whacked at hockey and eventually needed some surgery under a general. Routine post op monitoring involves pulse rate (clothes peg thing on finger). When this registered at 38bpm the nurse called the crash team. My sister was understandably alarmed and had started to come round. When they told her why she was surrounded by medics she just said "but I play a lot of sport and train hard". They all pushed off looking a bit sheepish apparently. Her normal RHR is in the low 40's.

Mine is in the high 40's and I guess a lot of us on here will register these kind of values. Good luck with further investigations and have a great Marmotte.

Snap. Exact same thing happened to me when I was coming round from orthopedic surgery* Fortunately the sight of the panicced nurses tends to raise the heart rate again...

Cheers, Andy

*Surgery required following a rather spectacular method of dismounting a bicycle at speed!

ut_och_cykla

ColinJ wrote:

My resting HR isn't particularly low at the moment beacuse I'm overweight and and not super-fit but the last time that I was slim and fit it dropped to 33-35 bpm. As I lay in bed at night I could feel my pulse go BUM-BUMP (Mississippi Mississip..) BUM-BUMP (Mississippi Mississip..) BUM-BUMP (Mississippi Mississip..). It was kind of relaxing and slightly scary at the same time :shock: .

I thought about getting one of those medical bracelets to record my normal HR so that medical personnel wouldn't get into a major flap if something happened to me.

You are probably almost unique nowadays - a person who can spell Mississippi...

ColinJ

ut_och_cykla wrote:

You are probably almost unique nowadays - a person who can spell Mississippi...

I used to lie awake at night learning new words between heartbeats !

Swannie

56 sitting here at work. It's usually 56-60 in the office.

I checked it first thing this morning before getting out of bed. 47, consistently for 3 mins, including some morning rolling around and hayfever nose scratching

Considering it used to be about 75-80 when I was at school, with fully rested (but not first thing in the morning) about 65-70, I'd say that exercise has certainly increased my heart volume/decreased my rate.

I look forwards to future improvements when I actually get aerobically fit and increase my VO2Max. (Well, Okay, I'm reasonably aerobically fit now... but honestly I think I'm what SHOULD be considered average for my age).

PutneyJoe

Just to update this thread - yesterday I got the all clear from the cardiologist - its not heart block or anything -- 'physiological not pathological' i.e. just slow due to exercise as you all suspected! Phew! Now for la marmotte!