Despite 61 million wearable fitness devices being sold worldwide last year, new data has found that the majority of people working out are still not fully clear on how to use a heart rate monitor to maximize their fitness goals.
The research from Polar, a creator of wearable sports and fitness technology, has revealed that athletes, regardless of fitness level, are, on the whole, only passively tracking their heart rate rather than actively applying it to workout regimes.
Polar’s analysed its users’ global data, taken from its range of products from August last year to January 2017, scaled the workout information based on heart rate levels, with one denoting “very light” exercise, two “light”, three “moderate”, four “hard” and five “maximum.”
Based off this scale, its data found that people who train an average of 3.5 times per week spent most of their time in levels two and three. Despite training often, these people are are not challenging themselves and reaching higher heart rate levels during workouts, which can result in mediocre or plateaued results.
By contrast, people who train an average of 2.9 times per week actually maintain a heart rate level of four, as well as some time in levels three and five, which reflects hard intensity and at times reaching their maximum heart rate. Due to this higher intensity training, these people are at risk of injury or fatigue because they aren’t spending enough time building their endurance in lower heart rate levels.
For very active people, who train an average of 6.8 times a week, the data found that they vary their times in all heart rate levels, with the least time spent in five, meaning that this group understands heart rate training to make sure they’re meeting daily goals, ensure recovery, and avoid injury. Polar found that this group was likely to be experienced athletes, unlike the others.
Polar says that in light of these results, that runners who incorporate training guidance from its own running program can make a significant improvement on performance, claiming a difference between a 3:35 marathon finish or a 4:02 marathon finish, for users of its program.
In a statement to accompany the data, Molly Huddle, an American Olympic long-distance runner said: “I think beginners may not quite know what their personal target heart rate zones are in relation to training, as it’s something you learn by feeling out workouts or getting HR/VO2 Max testing done. I would start by trying to get HR data on a race or maxed out effort and use that as your jumping off point for figuring out what to target for workouts and recovery days.”
Polar was founded 40 years ago and is headquartered in Finland. Its products are sold through over 35,000 retailers globally.
