# Anyone using HRV/Whoop?



## dgregorie (May 1, 2007)

I’ve been into HRV analysis for a while, primarily as a means to help avoid overtraining. I started with Elite and recently started trying Whoop. The numbers I get from each are dramatically different most of the time. Whoop rarely gives me optimal recovery and quite often I’m in the red no training zone. Elite is rarely red. Anyone have experience with HRV and the various apps?


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## [email protected] (Dec 29, 2003)

I’m wanting to find an accurate HRV tool. At 50 years old I’m always wondering if I’m just tired or truly fatigued. Hoping someone has a good recommendation.


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## Salespunk (Sep 15, 2005)

I have been using Whoop for several months. Have not compared it to any other tools, but it has been interesting data. Still trying to tune in all of the variables for HRV. I have been under a tremendous amount of stress at work lately and I it has definitely reflected in my HRV.

Happy to answer any questions you have on the Whoop strap.


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## dgregorie (May 1, 2007)

I have a Whoop strap. I'm questioning it's accuracy as it gives me HRs during workouts that are a good 10 bpm or more than what my chest strap measures. Often what I consider to be a pretty mellow/standard ride gets estimated as maximally strenuous by Whoop. That makes me question the estimations of sleep and HRV. Before Whoop I was using the Elite app and if I use both in the same day the measurements are dramatically different. Many days Elite says I'm good to go while Whoop gives me a red/poor recovery measurement when I feel just fine.
I think, in general, I have a lot to learn about HRV, recovery, stress, etc but I would mainly like to know that the measurements that I am using to help guide my training are accurate and most of all consistent


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## Udyr (Jul 29, 2013)

I've been using HRV4Training with a Wahoo bluetooth strap and I've found that to be a cost effective and accurate option that tracks well with my subjective metrics. It has accurately predicted sickness so far, although I've only been using it for around 6 weeks.


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## m3bas (Dec 24, 2011)

Are there any of those watches that can measure HRV accurately as you sleep? The chances of me waking up and putting a strap on and lying still for the required time aren't great


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## primoz (Jun 7, 2006)

m3bas said:


> Are there any of those watches that can measure HRV accurately as you sleep?


Considering you need ECG accuracy for HRV, and considering there's no optical sensors with such accuracy, I honestly doubt there's any watch/device that could do what you want. At least in real life, as I believe paper can stand anything that some PR department decides to put on.


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## Salespunk (Sep 15, 2005)

If I understand the Whoop tech stuff, they measure HRV and RHR during the last deep sleep cycle. I am 100% sure it is not showing a continual number. It is supposedly measuring HR 100 times per second, compared to something like an Apple watch that can go quite a while between measurements. I have seen a decrease in HRV when I am sick, not sleeping well, etc. Not 100% sure of its effectiveness yet, will see more during race season starting in January. Still experimenting with what works (the time I go to sleep seems more important than how much sleep I get) and what doesn't.

Here is an interesting article about Kate Courtney and her HRV data during the run up to the Worlds

https://www.whoop.com/the-locker/fitness-tracker-data-world-champion-kate-courtney/


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## IdahoPotato (Dec 29, 2017)

I had a Polar v800 watch a few years ago and it was the best of the watches I have used at estimating my recovery needs. I have owned Garmin and Suunto watches and pretty much disregarded their estimates on recovery. I just picked up the Polar Vantage V to see how it fares. 

That said, the best understanding of fitness/overtraining has been through tracking all of my training and racing with a power meter and analyzing the results in Golden Cheetah. Each persons exact fatigue limit is different, but there is a range to get you started and it’s a great starting point. Training and racing with a power meter will teach you all you need to know to track your fitness and fatigue.


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## primoz (Jun 7, 2006)

IdahoPotato said:


> I had a Polar v800 watch a few years ago and it was the best of the watches I have used at estimating my recovery needs. I have owned Garmin and Suunto watches and pretty much disregarded their estimates on recovery. I just picked up the Polar Vantage V to see how it fares.
> 
> That said, the best understanding of fitness/overtraining has been through tracking all of my training and racing with a power meter and analyzing the results in Golden Cheetah. Each persons exact fatigue limit is different, but there is a range to get you started and it's a great starting point. Training and racing with a power meter will teach you all you need to know to track your fitness and fatigue.


That's just too much BS to get by. Unless you are robot, and "fatigue" means bearings that don't run smooth anymore and needs to be changed, then powermeter won't tell a sh**t about fitness and fatigue. Regardless of what marketing departments of companies in bike industry are trying to tell you, human physiology has very little in common with basic physics. And power meters work on exactly that, physics only. They don't consider your body it's simple and pure physics. You need this much power to ride that fast at certain uphill grade, regardless of your feeling, regardless of your effort perception, regardless on temperature, regardless on anything except pure physic facts. Perfect for robots running on electro motors, not all that useful for human bodies that operate on completely different levels, and which on top of that have also mental issues. So regardless on what PR departments are (successfully) trying to sell to people who think are cycling coaching experts yet they didn't read not even intro on Human physiology for dummies, and needless to say they never studied anything remotely related this and coaching, power meters are cool expensive toys that bring pretty much nothing into all this. Ok they do have some value, but on way different levels then average user understand.
Heart rate on the other side does exactly that... gives you info on your body, regardless on physics. So if you really want to understand your body, your fitness and your fatigue, heart rate is the key, power is bs.


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## IdahoPotato (Dec 29, 2017)

primoz said:


> That's just too much BS to get by. Unless you are robot, . . . power is bs.


I think I missed answering the OP's question; whether HRV can be used to track overreaching/overtraining.

Whoop uses a long term average of HRV and compares your current state against it, so that is how it understands whether you're recovered or not. Factors like work stress, too much caffeine, dehydration, poor sleep, duress in the home, etc. will register as fatigue with blood pressure based (Whoop) or ECG-based HRV and can confuse what really might be going on.

You can get by on just perceived effort (PE) for understanding fatigue, without HR or HRV. Power rounds out the whole picture of fatigue and fitness, in combination with PE, HR, and HRV, and it's a much better training tool than HR to boot. Power has been a much better measure for prevention of overreaching/overtraining in my experience. So well, that I rarely monitor HR anymore.

Just sharing what works best for me . . .

Maybe I am a robot.:eekster: YMMV.


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## Salespunk (Sep 15, 2005)

One thing I see a lot in discussions about Whoop is inaccuracy of HR during exercise. Short answer is that it does not matter. Whoop is not intended to be used to track HR or effort during rides etc. Whoop may market this to casual athletes, but I guarantee that people like Kate Courtney and Lawson Craddock are still wearing HR straps during their rides and workouts. If measuring stress during a workout is your intended use, look elsewhere. The only thing that is worse is something like an Apple Watch. It does not measure muscle fatigue and the rating of your workout is complete BS. I have gotten scores of 20.6 on a scale of 21 and it said that I had the highest exertion of anyone in the ecosystem for that day. I very highly doubt that my relative effort was the highest on Whoop for that day.

The only valid use of Whoop is for the HRV value and the calculation of your cardiovascular system's ability to take on load for the coming day. What it won't tell you is if your legs or lungs agree and it is merely one tool to be used in concert with others. Tools like Trainer Road, Strava fitness scores, etc more accurately reflect other data like overall fitness and fatigue.

As an example yesterday my Recovery Score was 73% so my heart was ready for significant load. My legs, not so much. During my ride I could barely maintain 200 watts and struggled to get my HR over 150 BPM. My max observed HR is 184 BPM and FTP is 271 for perspective. The goal is to get alignment of your cardiovascular recovery, fatigue and fitness on race days and that is what you see in the article about Katie Courtney etc.


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## Chowder Head (Sep 26, 2010)

I just started using the Oura Ring, its only got a week of readings so I don't think it has my baseline figured accurately yet. Its lightweight, the battery lasts 6 to 7 days and uses many factors to estimate you readiness. It's the second generation of the ring.









Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk


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## Sidewalk (May 18, 2015)

Just got a Garmin Fenix watch (on sale cheap right now, probably coming out with the 6 soon) which does HRV. I need to learn how to track and use it though to take advantage. But I am also tracking everything on TP and have a coach setting up my workouts, so it would just be info for him to use.


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## richde (Jun 8, 2004)

IdahoPotato said:


> I think I missed answering the OP's question; whether HRV can be used to track overreaching/overtraining.
> 
> Whoop uses a long term average of HRV and compares your current state against it, so that is how it understands whether you're recovered or not. Factors like work stress, too much caffeine, dehydration, poor sleep, duress in the home, etc. will register as fatigue with blood pressure based (Whoop) or ECG-based HRV and can confuse what really might be going on.
> 
> ...


Yup, power doesn't have feelings and it certainly doesn't care about your feelings. You can either hit the numbers, or you can't, and if you can't hit the numbers you normally do, that means something is amiss.

Whoop seems like something that would be useful if you know everything is right, your sleep is good in quality and quantity, your diet is dialed, and you're literally doing enough TSS to have you teetering on overtraining if anything in your life goes wrong. But if you're honest with yourself about the other factors and NOT actually on the edge of overtraining, it's a bit much.


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## Salespunk (Sep 15, 2005)

Quick update for everyone on my Whoop/HRV experience. For reference I ordered it and am paying for it just like anyone would. Middle of last week my HRV started dropping dramatically and by Friday was at 10%. I was getting plenty of sleep, hydration, etc and was not beating myself up on the bike. In addition I was not able to push any power on the bike and felt massively fatigued any time I rode. On Saturday my recurrent staph infection flared back up. What I had been feeling were the pre symptoms of the infection and Whoop was seeing the signals as my body started to fight against it.

I have had a few experiences with Whoop similar to this over the last 3 months of use. I am a believer in the technology if it is used correctly. As I stated above I do not use it to measure cardiovascular stress during workouts or try to use it to gauge fatigue. There are much better tools for those aspects.


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## mix123 (Sep 2, 2015)

I had a hard time understanding the Whoop subscription model. The cost is very over the top. Wearing the band 24/7 with the charging gizmo was also pretty weird. Went with an Oura ring and couldnt be happier. I barely know I'm wearing it and battery lasts 6 days. HRV / RHR / Sleep data has been great and a really good indicator for what's going on with my body/recovery.


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## osteo (Sep 9, 2010)

Good thread and questions. I debated on Whoop and Elite HRV and decided to try Elite with the Wahoo Tickr strap, and have been taking readings every morning for the past 7 weeks or so now.

One thing I read (as many of you probably have as well) is consistency, taking the readings first thing in the morning, so I've come up with a routine that seems to work without being bothered by the wife or the dog first thing in the morning. I know Elite HRV has come up with a finger sensor that from their literature is significantly more accurate than chest straps/watches.

I have found the numbers I get to be fairly indicative of how I've been feeling, correlating the amount of work/stress or lack of sleep (mostly) to the readings I have gotten in the morning and it has predicted getting sick and the numbers tanked when I was near death's door and knocking loudly (if anyone remembers that game!). But what I did read was that aerobic exercise which is what most of us do seems to have little change with those readings, and can actually be used as a recovery tool if you score high parasympathic readings according to Andrew Flatt (exercise physiologist that has done a fair bit of research). Most of the literature I have read seems to be from researchers that focus more on Anaerobic exercise, so more data/research needs to be done.

I have a buddy of mine that used it training for an Ultra (100mile trail running) and found a lot of success, he had a coach that monitored and made changes weekly and I think daily based on those results. Although on race day, he succumbed to the conditions and DNF'd, but heading in to it, felt way stronger and prepared than the others he has attempted.

I plan on using it for this coming season's training and will modify my training plan based on those readings, will see how it goes.

A good article from Traiing Peaks:
https://www.trainingpeaks.com/blog/...y-to-schedule-the-intensity-of-your-training/

D


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## rupps5 (Apr 9, 2010)

What hr monitors are working for hrv readings. I have a tickr x and get inconsistent readings. I think it may have smoothing. Email to wahoo was sent to see.

The polar 10 and 7 are suppose to not have smoothing. And most optical sensors have smoothing according to this article

https://elitehrv.com/compatible-devices#hrmonitors

Evolution Training Cycles


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## Lone Rager (Dec 13, 2013)

I haven't tried it, but the Scosche Rhythm 24 arm band optical HRM does HRV. You select it as a mode in the accompanying app. The app does not show data. It only sets the mode and allows transfer of data from the device's memory if used to record data. It also transmits HR via BTLE and ANT+ in real time.

The previous model, Rhythm+, does not do HRV.


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## rupps5 (Apr 9, 2010)

Tickr x is good to go says wahoo

"thanks for reaching out. Tickr X is not smoothing HR and can* be used for hrv readings"

Evolution Training Cycles


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## Hoverbike (Oct 26, 2011)

I have had the Whoop strap for almost a month. I am paying for the subscription plan which i am torn with but decided to give it a year. I think I am hooked. I like that it tracks the stress your body is under through out the day and how your heart and cardiovascular system is reacting to that stress. I have already begun changing habits that I have found to increase my HRV and recovery. Such as, I no longer read an article or watch a YouTube video on my phone in bed or before bed. I found that this activity would decrease my HRV. Something so small and benign has an impact. There are other things too but I give it a +1 so far.


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## HenryT2 (Jan 28, 2021)

I've tried Elite HRV and Welltory with Polar H7 strap. After a month or so, Welltory has told me only ONCE that I was good to go for working out. Several days, Welltory basically told me that if I get out of bed I'd die and Elite gave me 9/10 and 10/10. The difference seems to be "stress". Welltory keeps telling me my stress is "low" or "too low". Everything else is green. I don't know enough about it but how the hell do 2 programs give me such different results?


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