by Kay Bee

Created on: January 29, 2013

Your heart rate or pulse indicates how manytimes your heart beats per minute. This can vary depending on age,fitness levels, medical conditions and how active you are at the timeyour heart rate is measured. Your heart rate can measure how fit youare, how hard your heart is working and the intensity of exercise youare engaged in.

Heart rate is measured during rest,work and recovery. To monitor your heart rate during rest; you needto resting for at least five minutes before you begin. Obviously, ifyou have been engaged in strenuous activity, it will take longer foryour heart to resume rest mode. Therefore, taking your pulse beforeyou get out of bed in the morning or after you have been sitting fora period of time, are better options. A normal restingrate for an adult can be anywhere between 60 to 100 beats perminute per Medical News Today. However, this can vary depending onage, medical conditions and fitness levels. 

Measuring your heart rate is a good way to track your fitness levels and ensure you’renot working too hard. The age-adjusted metrics estimate what yourmaximum heart rate range can be during exercise, but again everyone isdifferent so it’s important to discuss this with yourdoctor.

Another way to gaugeyour fitness levels is to establish your recovery heart rate. This ismeasured by how long it takes your heart rate to return to itsresting rate after exercise. More specifically, it is the amount bywhich heart rate falls after 1 minute of not exercising according toWebMD. The fitter you are, the faster your heart should recover.  

So how do you measureyour heart rate during these different stages? Firstly, you need tolocate your pulse; commonly found on the underside of your wrist andon the neck. The National Emergency Medicine Association suggestsplacing the index and middle finger side by side in your oppositewrist about one inch from the hand base. Once you feel the pulse,count the number of beats in a minute to measure your heart rate.This can be done by multiplying the number of beats in 10 second bysix, doubling the number of beats in 30 seconds etc.   

If you would like to take your pulse whileexercising, it’s a good idea to stop exercising or slow right down,as taking a pulse while moving around can be difficult.  Somesports watches and specialized equipment also allow joggers andothers to measure and monitor their heart rate. 

Measuring your heart rate is a handy skillto learn. Tracking it on a regular basis may alert you to changes inyour health and is a good way to monitor your fitness progress. Asheart rates vary significantly, it’s important to check with yourdoctor what rate is normal and healthy for you.

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