Max Heart Rate Question

220 minus your age so your max heart rate should be 174. Of course it mostly depends on your cardiovascular system and what kind of shape you are in. Not sure if you want to push the limit though, most of the benefits fall at about 75-80% of that number.

Not a cardiologist, so take this with a grain of salt. I would think that you could theoretically slightly increase MHR if you totally stopped aerobic training and just pushed it hard every workout. Not sure why you would want to do that though. Pushing the HR too high too often can have some negative effects on the CV system. If you listen to the Peter Attia podcast "The Drive", he just had a cardiologist on this week or last week that described it 1000X better than I can.

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How does someone find their exact max heart rate?

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Run really hard for as long as you can

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How does someone find their exact max heart rate?

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I had mine measured in a clinical setting back when I was young running for LSU. They put me on a treadmill, shoved a tube in my mouth and taped it on there, put electrodes on my chest and started the treadmill at 9 minute pace. They increased the incline every 90 seconds and at the end I was running at about a 45 degree angle up. You ran until you dropped and a couple of guys on the team did hit the deck of a rolling treadmill. When done, they drew blood to measure lactic acid buildup. It was a fu king miserable experience. They were measuring our oxygen uptake too. I recall my max heart rate was 198 and a couple of guys got above 200.

Im also 46 and it does not matter if i run 1/4 mile or 6 miles, my heartrate is around 213. Its weird I know.

Are you fit?

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I had mine measured in a clinical setting back when I was young running for LSU. They put me on a treadmill, shoved a tube in my mouth and taped it on there, put electrodes on my chest and started the treadmill at 9 minute pace. They increased the incline every 90 seconds and at the end I was running at about a 45 degree angle up. You ran until you dropped and a couple of guys on the team did hit the deck of a rolling treadmill. When done, they drew blood to measure lactic acid buildup. It was a fu king miserable experience. They were measuring our oxygen uptake too. I recall my max heart rate was 198 and a couple of guys got above 200.

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That doesn't sound fun.

Update:

Running 5x800’s tonight in race prep. Last two intervals I hit a HR of 185. So, either I’ve managed to increase my max HR by 4 pts since my original post or I just didn’t push it hard enough to get there. May just go see the cardiologist and have them calculate it for me via a stress test. I’m due anyway.

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220 minus your age so your max heart rate should be 174. Of course it mostly depends on your cardiovascular system and what kind of shape you are in. Not sure if you want to push the limit though, most of the benefits fall at about 75-80% of that number.

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Why do people still believe this

I’m 36 and still get mine over 190 when I’m going full send on a workout

Hit 188 on my tempo run tonight. Going to see cardiologist and ask about it.