Using Heart Rate Monitors for Conditioning Classes

[dmworking]

Okay, Rip kicked us out of his part of the site. It was only a matter of time.

Here's the note I sent Hanley that started this whole thing:

The purpose of creative programming in conditioning work is to enable a wide variety of participants to receive more or less the same physiological stimulus from the activity. You do the best you can, scaling weights and reps and rest times for people of different ability, and it's primarily a feel thing as a coach.

I think it's bullshit.

We don't load 120 kg on everyone's bar for squats, and tell them to get "as many as they can," and scale up or down in big blocks of kg if you're a woman or an old person or something. It would result in enough unpredictable difference in the received stimulus for each person that it could not be considered training.

Yet, that's exactly what group conditioning does for classes, and somehow we think it's okay. So this begs the question: how do we scale the workouts, on an individual level, so that each person is actually receiving a titrated dose of the desired stimulus?

Enter the heart monitor.

What we're really trying to do, through intervals and AMRAPs and all the different bootcampy garbage, is trick someone into putting forth enough effort to get their heartrate into zone 4 or 5 for a few minutes, then back off, then back up, and so on. That sort of training will drive physiological changes in stroke volume and, depending on the intensity, mitochondrial density and substrate availability on the muscle cell level. If we're interested in greater capillary density, then they'll need to spend some time in zone 1 or 2. Through a smart combination of both, these people will get more "fit."

Pretty tough to do if you're coaching people 1 on 1, and impossible for a group. Really good crossfit coaches, who get paid to develop strength and work capacity in their athletes simultaneously, understand these concepts implicitly (if not explicitly). Not every workout is an all-out sprint; they'll program in "blocks" (movements that are more technical but not as metabolically expensive, in order to slow down the athlete and keep them from redlining). They'll also give qualitative guidance, like rowing "at a conversational pace," in order to keep people down in the zone 1 range.

But why not skip the qualitative mess and just have people use heart monitors?

If the goal is to have a workout where you're spending 15 minutes above 70% HRmax, then strap cheap HR monitors on your class and instruct them to look in their notebooks, find their HRmax, get 70%, and do enough burpees every minute to stay above that line. Some people will do 3 per minute, and some will do 9 or 10, but the stimulus as perceived by that person's cardiovascular system will be the same. Every once in a while, have people do an all-out row to find a new HRmax, and use that as the key-off for other workouts, like we do with a 5x3 squat workout.

Keep it fresh; don't always use burpees, use the prowler, use push presses, use (fuck, i don't know or care). But at least you know what everyone is actually doing, and you're not guessing anymore.

And then ATB's response:

So dmworking and I have talked about this at length, and I'm sure he'll chime in. But I think the important conclusions that we came to are this:

1. Every workout should be designed with an intended stimulus in mind. IE you should know what you want the workout to "feel" like for everyone. I think this is true for strength training and conditioning.

2. Having more data is an advantage.

So let's say you want to do a conditioning workout where people are working at around 75-80% intensity for a longish time, like 30 minutes. So you want a sustained, elevated heart rate, but you don't want anyone red lining or hitting a wall. I think there are two ways to do this.

First, you could strap a heart rate monitor on someone who knows their max HR, tell them start doing burpees until they get to 75-80%, and tell them to keep it there for 30 minutes.

Second, you can use the actual design of the workout to control the person's heartrate. Here's an invictus workout from CJ Martin that does that pretty well:

Every minute, on the minute, for 30 minutes:
Minute 1 – 15 Unbroken Wall Ball Shots (30/20 lbs)
Minute 2 – 10 Toes to Bar
Minute 3 – 10 Burpee Box Jump-Overs (24″/20″)

I've done this workout, and it does a great job of keeping your HR elevated, but never getting to the "red line" point. Was I exactly between 75-80%? I don't know for sure, but my heart rate was definitely elevated and maintained at that rate for 30 minutes.

So which is better? As with most things, I think it depends. The HR monitor will definitely be a more accurate measure of effort and intensity, but I have doubts on the feasibility of getting a group of 15-20 people to properly use the HR monitor. At the end of the day, the HR monitor will give you a more accurate measurement, and probably a better quality of training. But how much better? 50%? 5%? Is it worth it to go out and buy 20 HR monitors? I don't know if anyone knows.

Then you have questions about customer satisfaction. Is it more enjoyable for someone to do a workout with a couple different movements they can compare with their friends...or is it more enjoyable for someone to stare at a monitor for 30 minutes.

I know we all like to talk about optimization around here, but, especially in the context of running a business, I think the saying "the best program is the one you'll actually do" is an important consideration.

And my subsequent response:

So let's separate the issues here.

1. Materiality. Does the extra information you get from the HR monitor matter? As you said, there are very experienced coaches that can "feel out" a program and progressively advance their athletes' conditioning on an individual basis. I would argue that while this is possible, it is rare, and can only be accomplished if you know your athletes pretty well. For beginners or large classes, my bet is that the variation in training effect experienced by the athlete is great enough that the program is less effective.

Now, this is only my sense. You might take a group of guinea pigs, strap HR monitors on them, lead them through your conditioning workouts, and say "huh, actually they self-regulate pretty well to the point that the stress they're getting is exactly what I expected." Cool. You're a good coach, and you ditch the HR monitors. You also might try it out, and go "dear sweet jesus, these people are doing wildly different workouts than I would like them to be doing." After which you adjust your programming, the workouts conform to your intended stress, and then you ditch the HR monitors.

You might also find that the workout-to-workout feedback you get from individual HR monitor readings is so valuable that you have people wear them every time, and you begin programming around keeping people in HR zones for lengths of time, and stop caring about the number of reps or the weight. I don't know; someone has to try it to find out. My hunch is that if slight differences like WL shoes, microloading, and platforms can make a difference in the progression of acquiring strength, then very exact conditioning programs might matter as well.

2. Feasibility. Would people actually do this? No idea. I know that individual HR monitors are anywhere north of $40, and our gym has no problem requiring members to buy WL shoes for significantly more than that. You also might program one "general" workout, and then a more finely tuned HR workout for a group that "cares" more. I can't really say, it's going to depend on the people.

...readysetgo.

[Briks42]

what?

[Sean Herbison]

For reference: Reconciling Crossfit with Starting Strength

[ColoWayno]

Just off the top of my head, I don't think of Max HR as being terribly trainable. I'm sure it is to some degree, but within a limited range.

I Didn't follow the original thread so I could be missing the point.

[Sean Herbison]

Just off the top of my head, I don't think of Max HR as being terribly trainable. I'm sure it is to some degree, but within a limited range.

I Didn't follow the original thread so I could be missing the point.

Yeah, that wasn't really the point. More about using heart rate for optimal conditioning planning and execution.

[John Hanley]

I'm thumbing this in via my phone....so this is incomplete, but...

In my fantasy large format training space, I'd want my group class offering to look something like this:

Strength Classes:
Novice: 1.5 hours. 5 to 1 lifter coach ratio. Everyone's running LP
Int&Advanced: 2 hour blocks of coached "open gym sessions". Cookie cutter or custom programs, everyone's using "fatigue" to dial in optimum stress.

Auxiliary lifts/Conditioning Class:
~ 45 minutes:
30 mins of auxiliary/supplemental lifts (abs, curls, chins, rows, LTEs, etc programming changes weekly...this is NOT conditioning)
15 mins of prowler, heavy bags, rowers, monarch bikes, etc...dosage of stress optimized by HR monitors. Ideally, real time heart rates are fed to the coach's ipad or displayed on a big screen...so the athletes can just focus on pushing

No box jumps, thrusters, other stupid barbell shit, or chins for "conditioning"; no amraps; no negligence with dem gains.

[dmworking]

I'm sorry, John, for being such a nitpick-- but I believe it's spelled "gainzZz."

Am I understanding that you're programming 2 hours of lifting, with 45 min after that? or is it 75 minutes of lifting, with 45 min of aux/cond work?

Also, do you do 10 min of mobility work beforehand, or do you warm up with the bar?

Also also, where does the olympic lifting come in? Is that the bulk of the 2 hour block?

[John Hanley]

I'm sorry, John, for being such a nitpick-- but I believe it's spelled "gainzZz."

Am I understanding that you're programming 2 hours of lifting, with 45 min after that? or is it 75 minutes of lifting, with 45 min of aux/cond work?

Also, do you do 10 min of mobility work beforehand, or do you warm up with the bar?

Also also, where does the olympic lifting come in? Is that the bulk of the 2 hour block?

Yes, GainzZz™. Sorry.

These are totally separate classes. So, a program might be
M: strength, T: aux/conditioning, W: off, Th: Strength, Fri: Aux/conditioning

Fantasy gym has a 500 ft2 mobility studio. We have a generic routine, but we can customize as necessary. This happens before the barbell warmup...so dipshits like me can opt out.

Sure, Oly work happens during any of the 2 hour Int/adv sessions on the dedicated oly platforms. Beginners don't get an oly-centric program, 'cause...they're weak as fuck.

[Sean Herbison]

I'm sorry, John, for being such a nitpick-- but I believe it's spelled "gainzZz."

GainzZz is trademarked. You have to pay Jordan each time you use it.

[hollismb]

HRM training: The reason thousands upon thousands of recreational triathletes and runners are wasting most of their weekends, never getting better at their sport, because they're all hanging out in 'base' or 'zone 1 or 2', while attempting to build greater volume ('miles' being the key word). Hang out after a few races, talk to the guys that didn't win and have fancy watches and chest-straps, and tell me I'm wrong. This is the same reason why fitness tracker devices annoy me; if you're wearing one, you're doing it wrong.

I tend to agree with most of what Matt Fitzgerald writes in this article. It pertains primarily to running, but gets a few general points across. The whole thing is worth a read:

Strap on a heart rate monitor and ride a rollercoaster. As you fly along with a death grip on the safety bar, your heart rate will climb near its maximum. Does that mean you’re getting a great workout? No, it means your sympathetic nervous system is highly stimulated, just as it is likely to be during races, which is why heart rate is often 10+ BPM higher in races than it is at the same work output level in workouts.

For this reason, you can’t trust heart rate to properly control your pacing in races. My greater point is that your heart rate is affected by a variety of factors besides exercise intensity, so it’s a dubious choice as the metric by which to measure and control exercise intensity.

I don't know about you guys, but my heart rate jumps in the gym before I even get under the bar. Does that count as cardio or conditioning, even if I don't squat the weight? If you're doing your otherwise-easy opener at the powerlifting meet with everyone watching, does that means the single is harder today than when you did it by yourself for a triple a few weeks ago, or that you're now in worse shape?

There's also the fact that nobody who actually needs conditioning actually knows their max HR. So, what do you base it upon, a guesstimate formula that's about as reliable as BMI? Well, now we're back at square one.

And what are you going to do, tell everybody they need to buy and bring a HRM to class? I've actually heard of this happening, and it occurred at a Lifetime Fitness, in a pseudo-Crossfit-bootcamp class for soccer moms that wanted to get fit and toned and look good naked. As you can guess, they were always very pleased with their average HR and calories burned, and rewarded themselves with muffins or a vanilla latte for getting in such a great workout.