Did they give you a COVID antibody test (not that anyone appears to be coming back positive)

With your symptoms I’d be by passing the docs every time and going straight to A&E!

Good stuff KTC, all the best recovering, take it easy.

Did they give you a COVID antibody test (not that anyone appears to be coming back positive)

The A&E doc I spoke to yesterday mentioned it, but said that he didn’t think it was reliable enough to be worth doing.

Glad your sorted HR can be a worry
I’ve always had a high heart rate but when training for ultras it dropped right down but I’d never taken much notice of it, I use a garmin wrist tracker so not totally accurate but I wear it 24/7
Earlier in the year I collapsed while running 14 miles into a steady run (but it was a hot day) luckily a passing pair of paramedics in a car actually saw me drop and turned around to see me, they spoke to me checked pulse ect and called the ambulance, they did a number of ecgs but said your heart looks normal but it’s very low as is BP (I’ve also suffered with very low blood pressure since ultra training) so see a doc
Doc got me booked for ecg and I had to wear an ecg for 24 hours, here it went a bit mad as my doc called me to tell me I needed a pacemaker but when seen by a specialist he said due to the endurance efforts I do my heart was big and powerful but didnt beat much , but to protect it in the night it skipped beats (that’s what my doc saw and panicked me) but specialist said it was common for endurance athletes and a common sight on a heart ward my echo was normal too. And my collapse was probably poor hydration on a hot day
Anyway back to now I’m just recovering from covid and my hr has been for my little efforts in the 190s , and when I checked back 10 days before my symptoms my hr shot up both sleeping and during exercise so it’s a good pointer, I’m gradually working on my fitness and managed a full 5km run the other day just under 25 mins and my ave hr is down to 168, and resting is in the high 40s when its normally high 30s , but it has been in the 80/90s during covid
As a side note the garmin compared with the 24hr monitor was remarkably accurate tbh not exact but very close .
Sorry for the ramblings

What do people find their normal heart rate is for riding?

That depends entirely on what sort of ride I’m doing.

On a short (sub ~25min) race/TT, ~160bpm avg and ~185bpm max.

On an active recovery ride, ~110bpm avg and ~150bpm max (like last night, coming home up the short steep inclines in easiest gear).

On a long ride for me while not flogging myself up the climbs, like Saturday’s ~63.5 miles with ~4200 feet of climbing in 3hrs45mins {a new best gran fondo time for me, wohoo 😆 }, ~136bpm avg and 171 max (because of one silly little sprint, otherwise 165bpm).

I’m 46 and my weight is somewhere in the 78-79Kg ballpark.

Welcome to the post COVID-19 recovery club OP, things will return towards normality with time, for me is was ~9/10 weeks to really turn the corner and try gain back some of the losses.

One other thing to be aware of OP is that wired earbuds too close to the HRM strap can cause all sorts of odd readings. (My readings went up to 250bpm as the cable had got too close to the sensor under my shirt).

@spooky_b329 My normal average on a long ride is 130-140bpm with a minimum around 100 and max around 160-175. (I’m overweight or under tall and 57).

What do people find their normal heart rate is for riding? Mine is normally up at 150-160, I’m 37 and 75kg. I’ve used heart rate monitors off and on over the last few years but never really monitored it, I might dig back through Strava and see if it has heart rate from when I first got my Wahoo.

Varies massively by individual, suposedly based on size of heart (smaller ones beat faster etc). Mine is quite high, age 49 and max HR is 195bpm, but I have to be really pushing it to get there. Normally ride around 160-170 going up to 180/185 on short climbs where you just push through rather than slowing down. When I was younger I used to regularly go over 200, 207 is the highest I’ve seen running IIRC.

Last time I raced properly was the NPS in 2007, here is my HR trace from one of the rounds..

[url=https://flic.kr/p/L1HGV]NPS-2 HR[/url] by Ben Freeman, on Flickr

Thanks for those heart rate comparisons, I’m singlespeed so working hard on the climbs so sounds about right. 🙂

Have you had an antibody test, Kenneth? A positive result says you’ve definetly had Covid, unfortunately a negative test doesn’t tell you much at all, you may still have had it.

but to protect it in the night it skipped beats

That sounds…unlikely