Heart rate monitoring for losing fat? How to calculate a Target Heart Rate Zone to Burn Fat off!

The human heart pumps vitamins, minerals & water within, through and around all parts of the body in the form of blood. The movement of this water in and out of the body, like during breathing is how a person actually loses water, just like with sweating too. Another way water will be transferred is from the blood into the muscles, especially from working out. Regardless of the water, it is vital at which the rate of this flow occurs and that the body experiences a full spectrum from very slow to super fast ranges.
For optimal results, that are based upon a person’s goal or intention of physical activity, the heart can be monitored for a plethora of reasons. Lets keep this basic for BURNING FAT off the body. For example, the goal is to decrease body fat, so monitoring your heart rate will be critical to get fast results. Understanding what specific target heart rate zone to connect with will depend on your personal goal. Learning about the specific beats per min. for a given duration (TIME) will not only yield fast results, but be the most effective tool for gaging benefit from any physical activity.
How can we calculate this? These simple math equations will work perfectly…
First, we must calculate a person’s MAXIMUM HEART RATE, based upon AGE!
Lets now subtract your age from 220 to get your MAX HR:
Example 220 - 40 years young :) = 180 BPM (beats per minute)
This number represents the physiology of pushing blood through the body’s cardio-respitory endurance system at full capacity, like RUNNING for your life via sprinting as fast as you can!

Next, using a person’s MAX HR we can take percentages based up on several variables to create a unique training zone. A Fat Burning zone or Optimal Fitness Zone would be 60% & 80% of Maximum Heart Rate. A person that is new to physical activity might have a range of 50% - 65% to allow their body’s time to adjust to new movement.
Target HR Zone for Fat Burning based upon a 40 year young human.
Example 180 max hr X .6 (60%) = 108
180 max hr X .8 (80%) = 144
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So for this example we have a 40 year young (male/female) target heart rate zone for fat burning is 110 bpm - 150 bpm
Now what to do with this range while exercising? Well, play games with it and have fun, shoot your heart rate high towards the top or over it, then allow it to fall. Keep moving, just shift the speed, intensity (hill or stairs) or another variable to adjust for where you want to be with heart rate. Connect to the inner workings and that moving your beats per minute throughout that range (and above it too!) will give you an understanding that you always don’t have to be moving very fast to be getting benefits from a physical activity. A good example is to do a combo of walking & running (some call it intervals) to see how your heart responds to that. Hell, heart rate monitors are water proof, so get in the pool!!

Fitness and AGE what STAGE are you in?

General Fitness Facts based on your AGE.  Should a 15 year old be performing the types of exercises as a 45?  The answer is both yes & no, but the many variables should be addressed.  Here is a breakdown of each stage of life....

General:

Regular physical activity reduces the risk of many adverse health outcomes.
Some physical activity is better than none.
For most health outcomes, additional benefits occur as the amount of physical activity increases through higher intensity, greater frequency, and/or longer duration.
Most health benefits occur with at least 150 minutes (2 hours and 30 minutes) a week of moderate-intensity physical activity, such as brisk walking. Additional benefits occur with more physical activity.
Both aerobic (endurance) and muscle-strengthening (resistance) physical activity are beneficial.
Health benefits occur for children and adolescents, young and middle-aged adults, older adults, and those in every studied racial and ethnic group.
The health benefits of physical activity occur for people with disabilities.
The benefits of physical activity far outweigh the possibility of adverse outcomes.

Children and Adolescents:

Children and adolescents should do 60 minutes or more of physical activity per day.
Aerobic: Most of the 60 or more minutes per day should be either moderate-or vigorous-intensity aerobic physical activity, and should include vigorous-intensity physical activity at least three days per week.
Muscle-strengthening: As part of their 60 or more minutes of daily physical activity, children and adolescents should include muscle-strengthening physical activity on at least 3 days of the week.
Bone-strengthening: As part of their 60 or more minutes of daily physical activity, children and adolescents should include bone-strengthening physical activity on at least 3 days of the week.
It is important to encourage young people to participate in physical activities that are appropriate for their age, that are enjoyable, and that offer variety.

Adults:

Adults should do 30 minutes or more of physical activity per day.
Some physical activity is better than none, and adults who participate in any amount of physical activity gain some health benefits.
For substantial health benefits, adults should do at least 30 minutes per day (2 hours and 30 minutes per week) of moderate-intensity, or 75 minutes per week of vigorous-intensity aerobic physical activity, or an equivalent combination of moderate- and vigorous-intensity aerobic activity. Aerobic activity should be performed in episodes of at least 10 minutes, and preferably, it should be spread throughout the week.
For additional and more extensive health benefits, adults should increase their aerobic physical activity to 300 minutes (5 hours) a week of moderate-intensity, or 150 minutes a week of vigorous-intensity aerobic physical activity, or an equivalent combination of moderate- and vigorous-intensity activity. Additional health benefits are gained by engaging in physical activity beyond this amount.
Adults should also do muscle-strengthening activities that are moderate or high intensity and involve all major muscle groups on 2 or more days a week, as these activities provide additional health benefits.

Older Adults:

The tips for Adults also apply to older adults. In addition, the following guidelines are just for older adults:
When older adults cannot do 150 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity a week because of chronic conditions, they should be as physically active as their abilities and conditions allow.
Older adults should do exercises that maintain or improve balance if they are at risk of falling.
Older adults should determine their level of effort for physical activity relative to their level of fitness.
Older adults with chronic conditions should understand whether and how their conditions affect their ability to do regular physical activity safely.

The EASY WAY to move that body and ingnite that metabolism!

Metabolism and Physical Activity, I can do what to increase my metabolism?!!!


Every time a person moves their body they increase the output or burning of calories for energy which is a result of the metabolic rate of the metabolism.   Not to get to complicated, but the energy systems of the body label aerobic and anaerobic.  The use of oxygen output are a results of different types of physical activity and the body will use either Carbs or Fat as energy sources to support metabolic output. 

The way a person exercises will fall into 1 of 3 categories to either maintain or improve a part of the body/function.

 MUSCLES         2.  JOINTS          3.  HEART/LUNGS (Cardio)

Our Components of Health-Related Fitness create sub categories to apply exercise training principles.

Muscles are worked on by practicing muscular strength and endurance exercises


Joints are worked on by practicing flexibility through stretching exercises


Heart/Lungs are worked on by practicing aerobic activity such as walk/run/bike/swim.


What does all this mean?  Well, it is simple to place any type of exercise into one of the components of health related fitness becomes health enhancing.  If a person would like to tone the body (which is increasing muscle and decreasing fat), then they would be told by a personal trainer to work on Muscular Strength and Endurance, with Cardio and some flexibility too.  All the things a person should be doing anyway to maintain their health. 

Every exercise a person can do will help increase their metabolism, but sequencing exercises to fall into an specific intensity level and order can change everything.  I will post in my last two blogs some specific ways to exercise to fire up your furnace we call a metabolism that will be burning calories for hours post workout and allow the fat burning process to be moving exponentially faster then you could have ever imagined, but only if you apply it....

How can the heart be monitored?

That helps my heart feel better.......

What you NEED to know about your Heart...                 9.12.12

The lub dub in your chest is a major player for personal health, so if you want to be healthy in the least amount of time (truly its a lifestyle) or lose fat off your body, well its time to start paying attention to that HEART!  Understanding the science about the inside parts of what makes us human is important to being successful with accomplishment of any health related goal. 

Fat burning Zone, Training Zone, Aerobic Zone, well they are all the same and make up a person’s specific Target Heart Rate Zone. I should also mention it is the most effective way to train the body during aerobic physical activity.  Your heart rate matters and should be monitored to maximize your workout so you know when to kick in the intensity and when to pull back & allow your beats per minute to slow down (yeah, its ok to walk & be training effectively).

Its all about the numbers here, keep that in mind when training for anything (just maintaing a healthy life, running a 5K, or when trying to lose weight).  I train my clients to be smarter and move more effectively.  The first lesson is to use a heart rate monitor for training, especially for burning body fat because it provides immediate feedback for results driven training.

A simple HR Monitor (I recommend Polar Brand) can be purchased for under $35 & can be used in a pool too!  Playing games with your heart can lead to a more rewarding workout, as you become smarter about what is taking place inside your body, your results will start happening much faster!

Counting your daily steps has benefits!

The Pedometer Challenge                        2.19.12


If  you took time to read my blog about lifestyle choices verses organized exercise, this one goes a step deeper on how to apply a pedometer to your life.  This is a great opportunity to purchase (dirt cheap) a cool piece of technology that can help document your physical activity progress as you walk about your daily routine.  Totally not selling you something, but giving a strong recommendation for a recorder of valuable info on your health & fitness. 

Pedometers (if you did not know) are step counters that allow an individual to record several parts of vital data (depending on the model) to the health of the individual.  Basically their are guidelines to a healthy lifestyle, just to maintain health a person health.  To document progress and see real time results can also assist as a motivational tool as well.  My son just loves seeing the numbers go up, well so does daddy too!  Thats motivation enough!

The Surgeon General recommends that the average adult (to just maintain health) should accumulate 10,000 steps a day (while walking) and the gov’t has set up (www.fitness.gov) a website for a person to keep track of what they have accomplished.  Children & older adults have separate goals, but the bottom line is, how do you know unless you count?

Whether you are a seasoned veteran of fitness or a novice, I would encourage everyone to take advantage of this health enhancing opportunity.  I wear mine daily and love to constantly look down to see where I’m at for the day, plus several of my clients ask me how many steps I have taken.  I move to learn and learn to move!

Your Heart matters.......

        2.14.12 (Tues)

Made up of atriums & ventricles the human heart pumps basically vitamin, minerals, & water to all parts of the body, especially our vital organs in the form of blood.  On valentines day the heart is a symbol of love and not shape like the strongest muscle in the body.  Well, your heart does matter because if it stops, well you stop & some times its a slow painful process, yikes!

The heart should be monitored for physical activity that you are trying to provide results from your type of movement (exercises).  For example, a goal was to decrease body fat, monitoring your heart rate is critical to get fast results.  Understanding your target heart rate zone & applying specific beats per min. for a specific amount of time will not only yield fast results, but be the most effective tool for gaging your physical activity. 

How can you calculate yours?  Its a couple simple math equations......

 Subtract your age from 220 to get your Maximum Heart Rate:
          Example             220 - 34 years young :) = 186 (beats per minute)

Take your Max HR and multiply by both 60% & 80%, this gives you your Target HR Zone for training.
                        Example            186 X .6 = 112
                                                  186 X .8 = 149

A 34 year young (male or female) target heart rate zone is 115 bpm - 150 bpm

How to monitor you heart rate while moving?  A heart rate monitor is a must & relatively cheap now a days ($30) compared to other fitness equipment.

Now what to do with this range?  Well, play games with it and have fun, shoot your heart rate high & allow it to fall & understand that moving your beats per minute throughout that range (and above too!) will give you an understanding that you always don’t have to be moving very fast to be getting benefits from you physical activity.  A good example is to do a combo of walking & running (some call it intervals) to see how your heart responds to that.  Hell, heart rate monitors are water proof for the pool & great to be out hiking or mtn. biking a trail!

Work smarter about your daily routine, here is an idea...

Self Report of regular life style physical activity vs. organized exercise.  Do you really need a gym to have health benefits of movement?.....Here is something I do to be active  as a household chore, but turn into a fun fitness idea with adding that mental aspect of awareness. 

Component of Health Related Fitness Impacted:
                    Muscular Strength & Cardio-Respiratory Endurance
Task:  Shoveling Snow

Equipment :  Coat, gloves, boots, hat, & shovel   VS.     Various styles of Fit apparatus

Results of Shoveling:    Walked 1.5 miles in 30 min. of physical activity
        Took:  2418 steps of which 1264 were in my aerobic zone for 14 min
            Calories:  230 used & I definitely was in my Target Heart Rate Zone

How did I record the above statistics?  A pedometer, which is a step counter, but I have a super fancy one that has software, gives reports & I had to program my stride length, age, height & weight for the feedback of the above results.  Plus, this pedometer is specifically a walking and/or running pedometer made for movement is straight lines that is constant verses playing a game of basketball or tennis where constant direction changing is taking place.  Mine is super accurate, but all the steps & other stats mentioned above are off because I took more steps.  Reason being I wasn’t walking in a straight line consistently, my snow shoveling had a lot of stoping, shifting and other moving takes place when I shovel in a small space.  Basically, the pedometer is very accurate in a straight line, but sometimes does not record smaller movements.   So to me as a personal trainer to get the above stats is impressive, but to add that I know it was actually more beneficial because of outside variables such as lifting the snow, pushing shovel with upper body joints only, and actually feel my heart rate in my target zone for the entire duration of shoveling which was 30 minutes in length.

The take from it, well I always kept my feet moving & strategically moved snow in a pattern (like a repetition for when lifting weight).  The idea was get a physical workout with being aware of bending my knees & @ certain joint angel points to be just performing a push motion with one side of my upper body, then repeating with the other and my feet just slightly shifting..  When I paused to push the shovel with one side I definitely noticed my body alignment to have a flat back & then lifting heavy snow definitely needs to have balanced form.   The boost of energy required to impact to components of fitness definitely makes this a health enhancing activity that would keep my metabolism running high for a few hours after being done. 

FAT burning MISTAKE 2....

Another WORST things you can do if you want to ignite your body's own fat-burning furnace and get lean, strong & totally ripped in less time....

  I’m talking about RESULTS driven movements that can develop a super strong heart and core, which inturn creates a lean, mean body....

Mistake #2:  Doing long workouts

Longer workouts do NOT equal better or faster results. If you've been slaving away at the gym and your body isn't visibly changing, you can't do more of the same thing and expect a different result.
When it comes to getting lean and fit, your body responds to quality over quantity. I'm going to tell you the #1 way to super-charge your workouts -- this simple, yet overlooked method is the single fastest way to getting lean and ripped while cutting your workout time almost in half. No joke - this technique will open up a can of whoop-ass on your workout!
An example of what I’m suggesting is say 45 min bout of Physical Activity on your favorite piece of cardio (elliptical, treadmill, pool, cardio) equipment could yield 400 calories burned.  The next day is your strength day and you workout by lifting for 30 min. on your upper body, and that burns 250 calories. 
Total over two days you burn 650 calories and that took an hour & 15 min. (75 min. of activity time).  Well, what if I could simply modify what you are doing to burn 800 calories in one simple  25-35 min. workout?! Oh yeah, that work out is completed in one day & your metabolism would be elevated for a couple of hours after you finishes this high intensity training that works smarter and is performed in short periods of time. 
Full body movements that combine 3 components of health-related fitness (cardo, muscular strength & endurance) will directly impact another component, body composition (FAT to muscles ratio).  Do NOT Separate your workouts, but combined them into a SUPER Charged bout of physical activity!

How to BURN FAT OFF, Literally....

Here is one of the WORST things you can do if you want to ignite your body's own fat-burning furnace and get lean, strong & totally ripped in less time....

Well the worst things are that way because they waste your time and the bottom line, time is money.  To me its about working smarter, not harder, more efficient if you will.   What I am talking about is not maintaining your health, because all exercises have their place.  I’m talking about RESULTS driven movements that can develop a super strong heart and core, which in turn creates a lean, mean body....

Mistake #1: Doing long bouts of cardio
Look, you need to do cardio if you want to lose weight and burn fat...BUT there's a right way and a wrong way to do your cardio workouts. If you've been pounding the pavement or the treadmill with nothing to show for it (except sore joints and a pair of stinky worn out sneakers), you already know it takes a lot of effort to get minimal results. 

Of course cardio-vascular fitness is one of your 5 components of health-related fitness and needs to be maintained for optimal health.  So getting on your fav piece of equipment is fine, but for results driven effect this is how it falls on the worst list for FAT BURNING!

Combined the cardio with strength and endurance movements that utilize as many joints as possible.  A “Burpee and/or Squat Thrust” uses ever joint on the body & requires full body dedication to form & core strength.  The idea is to have super high intensity with functional (real world) movements that combined energy systems like cardio & musculare endurance with strength from body weight too.