First a little background on me. I'm a fairly big guy at 5'10 and 210lbs. I'm an average cyclist just looking to improve. I ride road/mountain about 3-4 times a week for a total of about 4-5 hours (I've only been doing this for a few months). I'm 27 years old and come from a football/sprinting background. I'm tying to become more serious about cycling but endurance has never been my strong point.

I just took my Polar S725 HR monitor on my first ride and I was shocked to see my average HR was 180bpm over an hour long road ride. with it being over 180 for 45 minutes. I checked it by hand and again on the same ride last night, sure enough the meter was right on. I was pushing pretty hard but still only managed a 17 mph average (which is quite good for me as I'm usually closer to 15mph) over an 19 mile ride with just 650ft of climbing. This average does include stopping at traffic lights so It may be a little higher. My max HR was 205bpm witch I hit on an uphill I attacked pretty hard. I was over 200bpm for nearly 2 minutes.

Some questions. Is this bad? I felt fairly comfortable at 180 but started to break down above 185. What should I do to try and make more power at this HR?

I have the Polar files (HR, Speed, Altitude) if anybody would like to see them.

gov2396, I think you know the answer to this!

HR are very personal things, and vary not only from person to person, but also sport to sport. I am 25, and have now stopped training with an HRM (it broke, I didn't replace it). When I was 21 I went running with a friend, trying to get a max HRM. He is a qualified personal trainer, so I did what he said. The result... I am comfortable at 170 - 180 bpm. My max was 215 and my minimum at rest in hospital the other day after an operation, but lucid and talking was 42. What I am saying is that for me, this is fine, but I know this because I was tested and assessed by professionals. I advise you to do the same and visit a doctor or other qualified person.

R.

Just had a physical a few months ago. Everything is fine.

If I were you, I'd:

Clearly define your aims

Get yourself a HRM training book and another book on general cycling training. I'd recommend books by Sally Edwards, Sally Reed, Ed Burke, Joe Friel.

If your aims are endurance, you'll struggle given your description of your background. Read about fast and slow twitch muscle groups. Also read up on building a base fitness. This involves increasing your milage and reducing your intensity. 180 avg HR with a Max HR of 205 given that you are new to cycling is too high an intensity to develop your base (core) fitness.

Also do some reading around the area of HR zones. You do however need to doing the boring stuff in building up a base before you can do more advanced training such as intervals and see effective results.


good luck...

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"Ride it like you've just stolen it!"

What's your resting / waking heart rate, and what's your heart rate 2 minutes after getting to 200 and then resting?

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GO HARD OR GO HOME

Resting is 59. Walking is in the 80's. Didn't test recovery after the max. I did get the cycling training bible last winter and did 6-8 weeks of the endurance workouts on an indoor trainer. I jumped into it too fast and ended up with tendenitis in my knee. So I had to stop for a few months. All good know but it's summer and as soon as I hit a small hill my HR blows out of the 160's into the 180's. My description is a little misleading. I've been riding for about 5 years. I've done a few centuaries and charity rides in the past but I wanted to increase my speed. This winter I plan on spending a lot of time on the indoor trainer at 60-65% (123 -133 bpm) to build a better base, but to stay in this range for an hour I have very little resistance on my Fluid trainer.

Here's my Plan:
This summer-fall. Just ride. Get my weight down from 215 to 180-170. (actually started 3 weeks ago and down to 203) Sounds like a lot but did I mention I gained 40 lbs in 6 months when I met my wife 2 years ago (didn't ride at all for a year). Winter. long low intensity endurance rides outside and on the trainer. Spring-I should be ready for intervals and hopefully by summer I'll be a little faster. I'm an egineer by trade so I really like following a well structured program laid out in the training bible.

Any thoughts?

I would say just ride at a level that you can maintain for day to day at this time. If that involves high heart rate? so be it. The argument against high-intensity doesn't really count in this matter because you're not really thinking about focusing on peaking twice in the year at your upmost potential for racing.

Also - individual heart rates are different... I find running a better test for max heart rates than on the bicycle (since you only want to establish safe heart rate?). It doesn't take long at running full pace around a 400 metre track to soon find your max. Some people can never reach it on the bicycle.

As long as you're not hurting yourself of course.