I recently bought a Garmin Edge 810 with a HR monitor. I did a 32km road ride at 32.6km/h at the weekend and I’ve just had a look at the ride data. I know it’s all a very rough science but at 33 years old, a max HR of 222bpm can’t be right, can it?!?

OK, I was giving it some beans along a strava segment near the start of the ride, but i’ve worked out my max HR should be 185-189ish. Is the HR strap or Garmin dodgy, or will I keel over during my next ride 😮

Cheers,
Jamie

The way it goes that high and comes down suggests an error, but it’s quite a long time to have stayed high, about 5 minutes, normally they’re real ‘spikes’.

It’s possible, but unlikely, particularly given it didn’t get nearly that close on the rest of the ride. Need a bigger sample – do a few more rides and see how high your HR gets.

And find some hills!

Looks OK to me, “formulae” for working out your max are estimates only.

Do a ramp test or similar.

My Suunto does that sometimes: starts off much higher than it should then settles down into something more realistic. I assume it’s a lack of sweat that causes it. Wetting the contacts first with saliva helps, though it’s not a guarantee.

So yes: it’s normal your HR monitor does that. And no: it’s not your real max HR.

Agreed. Dodgy contact points, once you get a bit sweaty it gives a better reading. However, best not to cane it without a reasonable warm up.

Yep, dodgy contact points. Try licking them before putting the belt on (yuk!) or using some conductive gel.

My Suunto did this a fair amount, my Garmin less so.

Thanks chaps. I did wet (lick) the strap contacts before I set off, I’ll try wearing it for a while to see if it stabilizes before getting on the bike.

Hills, sorry what are they?!? The joys of living in East Anglia- we got to the dizzying height of 115m on Sunday’s ride 😆

I’d like to do a VO2Max test but the places I’ve seen that do them with bike fits charge £££s.

EDIT- I’ve got a pretty impressive chest wig, I guess that won’t help!

Cheers,
Jamie