fitness

gazman1

Hi guys and girls, i have recently purchased a turbo trainer, i`m not very fit however i`m doing something about it, i use a polar HRM. I am following a programme i got on the net, its 25 minutes long. I have done 4 sessions on it and on my data my average heart rate has been 157, 155, 153 and 146 in that order, my fitness has been 22.37, 24.18 and 22.47 can anyone tell me what these figures mean, especially the av heart rate one coming down, am i right in thinking it means my fitness is improving, thanks,
Gaz

Paul057

Not really sure what you mean by your fitness score, but as for your average HR dropping, you are getting fitter if you are doing the same amount of work every session. Generally though you want to be in HR zones, and there is loads info out there if you just Google "Heart rate training zones". Which zone you train in will be dependent on what your goals are.

I'm no expert but that's my two 'penneth

MattC59

Are you given any units of measurement for your fitness score ?

gazman1

thanks for the replies,
Paul, not used any training zones as yet just want to get fit(ter) not sure how to use zones but will look into it.
Matt not sure what you mean sorry, im using a polar ft7 HRM

Gaz

MattC59

Units of measurement.
ie. If it was distance the units might be km or m.
You gave us some numbers for a fitness score, I assume that these were from your Polar ? and I was wondering if it gave you any units ?

Muffintop

Hello!
Get yourself a bike computer and fit it to your back wheel (or the wheel that spins) so you can measure how far you go when you're on the turbo. One that measures in miles/km and gives you your average miles per hour (or km per hour). It will be a good indication of getting fitter/faster on the bike - if you are getting fitter you should be able to go further (provided you are using roughly the same gears) and your average mph should go up. I found it better than using heart rate alone as that can fluctuate depending on how you are feeling on the day, and easier to track what you can do. For example, I know that at say 130bpm I should be able to hold a steady pace of 13 mph (doing this off the top of my head so if these seem wonky don't jump), getting fitter I should be able to either hold a steady pace of 13mph my heart rate should be lower, or at 130bpm go faster than 13mph average. I also find keeping a record of my highest and average speed, with my highest and average heart rate, along with my distance a good indicator of what I am achieving. I'm trying to do 10 miles in under 30 minutes on the old TT so I'm trying to increase the time I can spend spinning at 20mph. I can only hold this for about 17ish minutes before I colapse in a heap. Still it's better than my original 6 minutes.

cougie

You do need to make sure all conditions are the same for any turbo session to be valid to compare with another.

So same tyre pressure. Same resistance. Same temperature.

You may be better working from your HR - so aim to keep the HR the same for the duration of your session.
So try and aim for mid 150s.

If you let your HR keep declining - then you're basically getting an easier work out every time.

MikeWW

If you want to get fitter you need to ride often and for good lengths of time
You want your turbo sessions to be heading towards 45 mins (inc warm up and warm down)
Can you get out on the roads at the weekend?

gazman1

hi everyone thanks for the replies, just done a google search and found out what the readings mean, fat burn 2.21 and fitness 22.47 these are the times that i was in each of the zones i.e 22.47 minutes of fitness and 2.21 of fat burn its great google isnt it lol. keep the encouraging responses coming in though.

Gaz