# Racing Heart Rate too high?



## JBarn (Jan 7, 2010)

I just did my first "standard" distance MTB race of 19.5 miles ( 1hr 52 minutes). My past MTB racing experience has been the Mohican 100 ( 100k most of the time) every year.

I hit the race pretty hard and was very surprised to see my average heartrate at 171 with a max at 185.

I am 56 and my max has always been on the high side ( not sure if this is good or bad), but I was surprised to see this. I normally will see about 155 for a good hard endurance pace MTB ride.

What kind of rates to you see when racing?

Thanks,


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## Lone Rager (Dec 13, 2013)

Similar to my numbers at that age. Ten years on it's more like 165 avg and 175 max. Back then my ultimate max was ~190. Now it's ~181.


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## LyNx (Oct 26, 2004)

We're all different, so would be hard to give someone else advice on something like this, but doesn't seem to out of place, especially if you've been keeping fit for a long time and have the heart to maintain that exertion. Curious, was this at altitude or no? Only races I've done were years ago, at altitude and my avg was around 161bpm IIRC, but that as said was at altitude over 7k ft and I live at sea level. Max I managed to hit was 169bpm AFAIR, when it would normally, at sea level be 190-195bpm.


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## MSU Alum (Aug 8, 2009)

If you don't keel over, you're fine. I have a chipmunk heart....at 65, my max is about 195 and my average on a hard ride is 165-170. Find out what you're true max is and use it to tailor training otherwise comparisons to other people is pointless.


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## TheBaldBlur (Jan 13, 2014)

I haven't used heart rate as a training metric in quite a long time - is the old 220 - your age for a max heart rate no longer the untested standard?


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## JBarn (Jan 7, 2010)

TheBaldBlur said:


> I haven't used heart rate as a training metric in quite a long time - is the old 220 - your age for a max heart rate no longer the untested standard?


I think this is a general formula as it is different for everybody.

I was just surprised to see my average that high. the real deliemma
is how to get faster if I can't pump harder than I do.....the answer for me is to get off the brakes in the turns... lol


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## life behind bars (May 24, 2014)

JBarn said:


> I think this is a general formula as it is different for everybody.
> 
> I was just surprised to see my average that high. the real deliemma
> is how to get faster if I can't pump harder than I do.....the answer for me is to get off the brakes in the turns... lol


The fact that you survived tells us that you can go harder. You mentioned endurance pace and that is a much lower rate than max.


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## burtronix (Jun 5, 2006)

Read this:
The Haywire Heart: How too much exercise can kill you, and what you can do to protect your heart https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MZ6S2LP/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_P9zUzbXS91H9V

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk


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## BmanInTheD (Sep 19, 2014)

My last XC race I averaged 181 for almost 90 minutes. Max is about 198 that I saw a year ago. I did a 6-hour race in May and averaged 161 for 6 hours at age 57.


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