New Maximum Heart Rate Formula for Women

Some runners would measure their heart rate when they run.  My Garmin 405 and Adidas miCoach comes with a heart rate monitor to check how much effort I am exerting when running.  Knowing your heart rate and your maximum heart rate can help you gauge your performance better and help you improve in your runs.  More info on zone based training at the miCoach website.  The typical goal is to stay within 65 to 85 percent of the estimated maximum heart rate, depending on whether you are trying to build aerobic capacity or increase endurance.

The old simple formula was the same for both men and women.  It uses your age as part of the calculation.  But a new research showed that women have lower maximum heart rate. Meaning, they don’t have to work as hard as men to reach their target goals.  They will get the benefits of the exercise without being exhausted.

The old formula is,

This is the simplified formula and is just an estimate.  Exact value will vary per person.  For men, this formula still hold true.  So if you are 30 years old, your estimated maximum heart rate is 190 beats per minute.  And the target rate is 162 beats per minute which is 85% of the maximum. I rounded it off from 161.5 since there is no 0.5 of a heart beat. 😀

Researchers at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago announced a new formula for calculating a woman’s maximum heart rate.

With the new formula, a 30-year-old woman will have an estimated maximum heart rate of 180 beats per minute.  Compared to 190 in the previous computation, this is quite significant.

This formula is based on averages so the actual maximum heart rate per person my be higher or lower than the value calculated.

I have a 190+ HR(max)

In my case, I should have a maximum heart rate of 189.  (Are you now trying to compute for my age?  Grrr…) But my heart rate monitor would sometimes tell me that I’m running at 190+ already.  Is that bad?

Dr. Martha Gulati, cardiologist and assistant professor of medicine and preventive medicine at Northwestern, who led the study says, “There’s nothing wrong with achieving a higher heart rate with exercise,and if you can maintain that, it’s fine.  But it might be that some women are getting tired and need to stop or slow down because they’re not able to maintain their heart rate at the higher level. But they’ve been using the wrong numbers.”

I don’t have a HR Monitor

Using my HRM helped me reduce exhaustion during my training as long as I follow the target zone and resist the urge to run faster than the training plan.

But, before you get a pen and paper to include a HR Monitor in your wishlist, here’s a word from Dr. Tim Church, an exercise researcher and director of preventive medicine at the Pennington Biomedical Research center in Baton Rouge, La.

Dr. Church says that except for elite athletes heart rate monitoring is not very useful and can distract from finding an exercise program you enjoy and will stick to.

“Everyone kind of has their own natural pace,” Dr. Church says. “If you like to work a little harder, then work harder. If you like to work less hard but a little longer, then do that. Find what works for you.”

For a more detailed article, visit the nytimes.com

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