Your age to determine heart rate training. JUST NO.

I’m finally going to give my thoughts on why 220 minus your age is a poor way to determine your Heart RATE (HR) training zones. I think the best way to illustrate this is from my own experiences and back it up with some science. I’m sure as endurance athletes. you are familiar with this tired/old/misunderstood way to establish your training zones. Sadly, the general public still thinks this is the best way to determine your “Fat burning zones”.

Many years ago I was coaching a Slovenian professional cyclist A. Ilesic. Aldo went on the win many UCI races throughout the world. Talented, big, strong, long sprinter. (Somebody that could win a race from 300 meters. That was his “jam”). My coaching staff also included Boyd Johnson, founder of Boyd Cycling. For information purposes let’s use round age numbers.

Aldo: 25 years old.

Boyd: 35 years old.

Chad: 45 years old.

With the help of science, we were able to determine each other's LTHR (Lactate threshold heart rate, long before power meters came on the scene). These aren’t exact, but they were close.

LTHR info:

Aldo: 144bpm

Boyd: 154bpm

Chad: 164bpm

If we were to take our ages and subtract them from 220, one of us, all of us, some of us would be under training or over training. It was incredible to see just how off this information can be. Joe Friels Step 1 is a better way to determine LTHR. I urge you to use science to determine your training zones. (I have also found that running LTHR is higher than cycling LTHR!!!). Test often.

Tailwinds,

Chad‘