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Max Heart Rate - Integration Time

New 235 user here. I'm new to interval training, been doing medium/light strength training and rowing about 3 months. Just started doing all out intervals on the rower. The watch will often show max heart rates well over the value reported to Garmin Connect. I'm assuming that's simply due to averaging over a time period, but my question is: "How long do I have to sustain a given heart rate for that be reported for the day's max heart rate?"

Being new on my fitness journey, my max effort intervals are pretty short (currently doing 30s work / 1:30 rest), and I can hit 176 bpm as displayed on the watch, but then when I look at my logs it will show it as something like 138bpm. Does anyone know the averaging window size they're using or how this is calculated?

  • Not sure where you are seeing the various values in Garmin connect.   But let me give some insight.

    Your daily resting and maximum HR seen on the 'Daily Summary' and 'Report' are often.... not quite right.  Like clearly you'll do a workout and have HR well into the 170's for a numerous seconds or minutes... yet it will say max for the day is 164... I don't think there is any documented window for what that is considered.   Same goes for resting heart rate.   It is almost always 2-5beats higher then the clear resting heart rate from a casual check most days, sometimes higher... sometimes way low however.   So take those two numbers with a grain of salt.  Unfortunately you can not edit these two values... :-/

    In a recorded workout actvity... the live heart rate is recorded and should display the maximum as part of one of the data points.   This should be right, and can find it on the heart rate graph. 

    Your profiles maximum HR (for setting zones, calculating vo2max, training effect, etc) isn't set based on activities observed, but a manual set or based on age (iirc).   

    During an activity , use of the lap button will help allow for capturing avg and max HR during each section (can view later on GC).  Although often the max HR of an interval will occur during the recovery lap that is after the work lap.

    Good job with your fitness journey!  keep it up!  

  • So. I'm not quite ready for 1 minute intervals yet, but I can main 45s/2min intervals, and even going to 45 seconds seems to vastly improve the correlation from numbers I see on the watch to the recorded values. Hit 186 briefly on the watch today (not sure if I believe it - I turn 50 this year), and it recorded 183 for the recorded max in the workout.  Best of all, I finally got the heart rate data connected to the Concept 2 rower app, so now my recorded workouts actually have heart rate data!

    It's a shame the VO2 max feature only works with running (not a runner)

  • Decline of Max HR isn't very consistent.  When I first started running maybe 10years ago, I would give some all out efforts on TM, and hit 190ish... figured max was 195 or so if it would have been a 'race day' push.  Well now that I marathon+bike... I can't get my HR up nearly as easy and lucky if I can hit 183!  Figured some my max has dropped over the years as well as more aerobic in shape then I am musclular... so hard to get legs moving fast enough to max out HR.

    fast forward to this summer in a 5k that I ran perfectly and took first in Age grp, sprint the last minute or so of race to try make huge PR.... hit 195bpm (with chest strap... nice smooth graph)!!!!  So nearly zero max HR loss over 10 years...  Plus your MAX when you were 25 very well could have been 225... so even if it has dropped a bit, it could still be 200+  

    Also they have shown that with excercise / HIIT that maximum HR doesn't really drop much over the years.

  • Nice! I was using the chest strap. I was also completely sedentary up until 3 months ago and fat (30% - goal is to get down to 19%, maybe 16. Also a shame that Garmin lets you set weight goals but not body fat - I'd be more than happy to hit 16% body fat at my current weight).

    VO2 max is the other of my priorities but don't have a goal (with numbers on it) yet. I do remember when I was a volunteer firefighter that our captain outweight me be a good 100lbs - about 50%, but his air bottle would outlast mine every time. Even though I wasn't grossly overweight, I had a desk job, and he did manual labor for a living. Buying a bit of breathing room before  the onset of exercise induced asthma is a major reason behind the cario push right now.