What is the appropriate heart rate for exercise and fitness?

For ordinary healthy fitness people with no underlying diseases, controlling the heart rate within the range of 60% to 80% of their maximum heart rate during daily exercise is the best choice to take into account both safety and effectiveness. The most common way to estimate the maximum heart rate is 220 minus the actual age. After calculation, a 30-year-old person's exercise heart rate should be maintained at 114-152 beats/min, and a 40-year-old person should basically meet the standard if the exercise heart rate is maintained at 108-144 beats/min.

However, this value is only a reference. There has been controversy in the sports circle about the heart rate reference standard. Many people complain that the 220 age reduction formula is too rough - after all, everyone's basic cardiopulmonary ability is far different. The resting heart rate of people who exercise all year round may only be more than 40. The resting heart rate of frail and sedentary people can reach 90. Applying the same formula is definitely not accurate. Now there is a more accurate calculation formula that uses 208 minus 0.7 times age. The error will be smaller, but the essence is still an estimate and cannot replace everyone's actual physical reaction. A novice student I taught before was 25 years old. According to the formula, the maximum heart rate was 195, and the 60% threshold was 117. As a result, when he first started practicing brisk walking, his heart rate reached 110 and he was breathless and speechless. After two hard walks, he was so tired that he caught a cold. Later, I adjusted him to a comfortable range of 90 to 110. After a month of cardio training, he naturally touched the 120 line and no more problems occurred.

If you just want to take a walk after a meal to stretch your muscles, or if you have weak blood vessel elasticity in the middle-aged and elderly people, you don’t need to reach 60% of the line. 50% to 60% of the maximum heart rate is enough. To put it bluntly, you can still chat normally with the people around you without gasping for breath during exercise. Square dancing, brisk walking, and Tai Chi can all be done at this intensity without putting any burden on the heart. If you have a training foundation and want to practice intermittent sprint endurance, it's okay to occasionally raise your heart rate to 85% to 90% of your maximum heart rate. When I was training for 10 kilometers in preparation for a competition, my heart rate often rushed above 170 during the sprint section of interval running. I just maintained the aerobic zone for about 1 minute and then dropped to 130. As long as I don't stay in the high heart rate zone for a long time, it will be fine.

Nowadays, many exercise physiologists have suggested that you don’t need to be too stuck on the heart rate value. The body feeling is always more reliable than the number. As long as your breathing is steady and your movements are not deformed during exercise, it doesn’t matter even if your heart rate is 10 beats higher than the estimated range. If you are dizzy, flustered, or feel tight in your chest, you must stop and rest immediately even if your heart rate is still within the so-called safe range. Of course, if you have underlying diseases such as high blood pressure or coronary heart disease, don’t calculate the values ​​by yourself. Before exercising, seek an evaluation from a cardiologist and set an upper limit for your exercise heart rate according to the doctor’s instructions before exercising. Safety always comes first.