something I wrote to someone (cyclist) today:
12:53 <@irma> some research warns against 30's RHR ... but, I wonder if there's a difference in how it's achieved.. ie, achieving it by being very lean & light, with low/moderate cardio, versus: TONS AND TONS AND TONS OF CARDIO
12:54 <@irma> the former seems safer ... your heart just doesn't have to work as hard, not as much mass/tissue to pump blood to
12:54 <@irma> the latter is an adaptation to very high levels of cardiovascular work
12:56 <@irma> i mean you hear stories of some people requiring pace makers later on in life.. like alberto salazar
12:56 <@irma> but, i wonder if that's also partly due to drug use in addition to tons of mileage
12:57 <@irma> i don't want to need a pace maker later on in life, that's for sure
http://www.sciencefocus.com/qa/does-human-heart-have-finite-number-beats
Lower heart rate = longer living???
I do like the quote that "you don't die because you run out of heart beats, you run out of heart beats because you die".
hah that's a nice quote. makes sense to me for sure: the idea of a certain number of heart beats has always sounded ridiculous to me. ie, by increasing the number of beats (via training), you will improve the quality of your heart, cardiovascular system, and health in general, thus giving you more beats.
however, you have to be careful with a chronically low resting HR IIRC .. apparently it can "permanently desensitize" tissue in the heart, people can end up needing pace makers and such. I posted some studies on it somewhere in this sub-forum. I think the key is to take planned periods of time off/detraining, even if it's just a week here and there, and a more extensive detraining period at the start of ones offseason, ie 3 weeks or so etc. Also, to make sure you're alternating easy/hard training, getting in a rest day per week.
dno though.. something to keep ones eye on. As for myself, when I take a several days off, my resting HR goes up a little bit, it seems. But then it comes back down pretty quick with training.
Testing HR as I sit at work. It's varying from 55-58. Only one coffee down this morning though. It's 9.45 and I normally would have had 2 by now.
nice! on the way to those sub50's hah.. another thing to "PR"
ya i've had some interesting results with caffeine -> very low HR's after caffeine usage. kinda odd (maybe?).
peace!