Be still my beating heart

windowgazer

I've been going to the gym regularly for two years.
I'm 5 ft 7" and 8 1/2 stone. I go three times a week and do 25 mins treadmill(5 walking, 20 running), 10 minutes rowing machine, then some sit ups. its a pretty basic workout but its a home gym and we're getting more stuff soon for it. I do it to keep the weight down, not to bulk up as I think too much muscles on girls is a bit grotesque.
My problem is that recently I have gone from 15 to 25 mins cardio and while I enjoy the results (lost a little weight), I find it hard to recover from it.
I usually have a light dinner 45 mins beforehand and go in at 7-7.30 for a workout. But since increasing the cardio part my body can still be very tired when I go to bed at 10-10.30. Also, sometimes my heart can still be beating strongly when I try to drift off so it is affecting my sleep.
Has anyone else experienced this? What can I do to help me recover?
Changing the time of the workout is nigh on impossible as I work during the day.
Thanks in advance.

The Bollox

cut down on the cardio

Transform

Marts wrote:

cut down on the cardio

Yes just as easy as cutting down on the cardio!!
NOT

First off - use a more balanced program i.e. do a few push-ups, dips, lunges and squats to increase your muscle tone 12-15 reps once or twice along with the abdominal work.

Second - what speed are you running at? You will find that when you increase your time you will have to decrease the speed so your heart rate will not continue to rise, also if your heart rate is too high (need your age first, please) you will not use fat as an energy source during high intensity exercise (this is a very broad statement and VERY individual).

So overall balance the program - cardio, resistance and stretching (can you touch your toes, if not work on flexibility) and reduce your pace so you can last the time. Then build it up i.e. 1 min slightly faster 3 mins at normal easy pace, following week 1.30min slightly faster, 2.30min easy pace etc etc

Best of luck

windowgazer

Transform:
Thanks for that.
I'm 24. I do stretches as well (just after warm up and after cooldown) and can touch my toes with ease! I ahad atrocious hamstring flexibility a year ago and learnt my lesson.
Speed... not sure how he treadmill reads but I am pushing myself (couldn't talk while running). I'll try to bring in more lunges/dips etc and try varying running speeds.

case_sensitive

Agree with transform, if you're running at a stead 11kmph or so for 25 mins, you could be putting too much pressure on your heart, try a longer warm up (if running on a treadmill I'd normally do:
2 mins 4kmph
2 mins 7kmph
2 mins 8kmph
8 mins 10-14 kmph (depends)
1 min 8kmph
1.5 mins 6-7kmph
2 mins 4 kmph

I used to run 7km outside every morning, and went to work most days with a very red face, I'm pertty fit, just an unfortunate side-effect.

there's no reason why you should cut down on the frequency of your cardio, most people get far too little, just maybe lessen the intensity. You burn almost the same number of calories walking a km as running it..
About your heart-rate, take 220 - <your age> = max heart rate (and more than that and you're in real danger of a heart attack!), then try to train in the 60 - 70% range (115 - 135 ish).

I wouldn't worry about bulking up too much, it's remarkably hard to do :->
You should stick to doing lots of repetitions (15-30) of not much weight, stay away from bench presses, but just about everything else will make you feel and look better.
If your heart is going the clappers more than an hour after exercise it might be worth doing some reading on it.
Best of luck,

logic1

case_sensitive wrote:

You should stick to doing lots of repetitions (15-30) of not much weight

Why

stay away from bench presses

Why

but just about everything else will make you feel and look better.

What does "everything else" encompass?

.logic.

case_sensitive

hmmm, helpful logic, let me school you..

You should stick to doing lots of repetitions (15-30) of not much weight

- body-building 101; to develop shorter, larger muscles do very few (2-8) reps of as heavy a weight as you can lift (with spotting). Exact opposite for toning/definition, may reps of little weight, in combination with stretching elongates and defines the muscles without increasing size dramatically.

stay away from bench presses

- Bench presses work your pecs primarily, and in girls tend to contribute to shrinkage of boobs. Girls and large should stick to fly-type exercises that define the pectoralis minoris etc rather than the 'man-boob' majoris.

What does "everything else" encompass?

Christ, you want me to write a program?
I will, but it'll cost ya :->

logic1

case_sensitive wrote:

hmmm, helpful logic, let me school you..

I'm afraid you may need to retake junior infants if you think that was schooling.

You should stick to doing lots of repetitions (15-30) of not much weight

- body-building 101; to develop shorter, larger muscles do very few (2-8) reps of as heavy a weight as you can lift (with spotting). Exact opposite for toning/definition, may reps of little weight, in combination with stretching elongates and defines the muscles without increasing size dramatically.

For a start you cannot change the length of a muscle. The length of any given muscle belly is genetically pre-determined on an individual basis in the womb. Every muscle head has insertion points which govern it's length. These cannot be altered. Each muscle can consist of one or more heads of varying lengths again none of these can be altered.

Now that we've covered that little moronic outburst of yours lets move onto "toning". Toning does not exist. You can either anabolise or catabolise muscle in varying degrees, you cannot tone it.

Rep ranges of 6 to 15 are often employed to increase hypertrophy. Along with an anabolic environment these ranges applied properly with the exercise in mind will produce the greatest hypertrophy. Women need not worry about bulking as their bodies contain very little testosterone and unwanted/unexpected anabolism is rare.

Rep ranges as you recommended up to 30 reps are pointless. These do little more than build muscular endurance and have very little effect on anabolism hence very little effect on giving the body a more pleasing appearance. There are little or no peer reviewed scientific studies that support such high rep ranges for the purposes of anabolism or as you incorrectly put it "toning".

When women want to "tone" it's often the case that they simply need to lose fat not build muscle.

stay away from bench presses

- Bench presses work your pecs primarily, and in girls tend to contribute to shrinkage of boobs. Girls and large should stick to fly-type exercises that define the pectoralis minoris etc rather than the 'man-boob' majoris.

How on earth would bench pressing contribute to the "shrinkage of boobs" as you so childishly put it?

Female competitors in Fitness and Figure have very small breasts because of the increase in LBM and the significant decrease in bodyfat much below normal levels.

The truth is training the pectoral region for women usually greatly improves the breast profile and lifts the breast giving it a much perkier appearance. It does not shrink the breast tissue or anything else ridiculous.

What does "everything else" encompass?

Christ, you want me to write a program?
I will, but it'll cost ya :->

No thanks, you obviously haven't a clue what you're talking about.

.logic.

pwd

Your heart beating like that may indicate overtraining.
Do you monitor your heart rate while you exercise? For general cardiovascular exercise you are advised to stay within approx 140-170 beats per minute for your age...the figure might be slightly different for women.
Exercising more intensely than this improves your ability to perform at high intensity, but does not improve your aerobic fitness as well, and also causes you to canibalise muscle.
Glutamine is supposed to help your body deal with the effects of overtraining.
If your aim is to lose, or keep down, weight, lower intensity exercise is far more effective (walking is better than running for this).
I would suggest running for longer at a lower intensity.
Also eat plenty of unrefined complex carbohydrate, suich as brown bread, brown rice. Not white bread, which is not much better than sugar.
Everything logic said is correct.

Transform

Gotta agree with Logic again.

Case sensitive - sounds like you have just done your NCEF or NCEHS qualification and are in need of a lot more schooling!!

Windogazer - well done and keep it up, as said lower intensity a little and build it up slowly. Also round out that pogram and use heavy books or whatever you have at hand to make the exercises more challenging.

Musashi

About your heart-rate, take 220 - <your age> = max heart rate (and more than that and you're in real danger of a heart attack!), then try to train in the 60 - 70% range (115 - 135 ish).

This is a very simplistic way of getting a rough estimate of some ones max heart rate.The right way to do it is using a series of maximal effort sprints and averaging out the results.
Possibly you ned a little more schoolin' yourself before you try to advise or indeed patronise anyone on this forum or in real life.
Why does this remind me of the guy wanted to criticise other gym users he felt were not training "correctly" according to himself??

You can accurately determine your max HR during a hard interval session. An appropriate workout is to warm up thoroughly and then run 3 high intensity repeats of 2 to 3 minutes up a moderate hill, and jog back down right away after each one. If you run the first hill at 90% effort, and then run the last 2 all out, your heart rate should reach its maximal level during the 2nd or 3rd repeat.

from here

pwd

Don't know if that is entirely safe advice for someone already experiencing palpitations.

Musashi

I would advise anyone experiencing palpitations to get themselves to a cardiologist.You don't want to mess about with your health,look at how many very fit young men have died in recent years,top GAA players for example.
The point I was making is that the correct way of measuring MHR is using an electro cardiogram and a running machine.For a rough estimate subtracting your age method is ok, but training and getting fitter will alter the actual max rate and the corresponding optimal training band.

Pherekydes

Musashi wrote:

I would advise anyone experiencing palpitations.

Palpitations were not mentioned. The difficulty of drifting off to sleep after hard training is due to slight overtraining. Step up training more gradually. As you get fitter this problem will ease. But it is one of the drawbacks to training at night.

Transform

Musashi wrote:

I would advise anyone experiencing palpitations to get themselves to a cardiologist.You don't want to mess about with your health,look at how many very fit young men have died in recent years,top GAA players for example.
The point I was making is that the correct way of measuring MHR is using an electro cardiogram and a running machine.For a rough estimate subtracting your age method is ok, but training and getting fitter will alter the actual max rate and the corresponding optimal training band.

The way you measure max HR is NOT through a electrocardiogram (ECG) its through a VO2 max test that would simply use a heart rate monitor (as i did myself 2weeks ago).

Also keep it simple as with the initial request

Musashi

Bill Haskell, an exercise physiologist at the U.S. Public Health Service had been given an assignment by his boss Sam Fox, MD. Dr. Fox, a cardiologist, was scheduled to talk at a World Health Organization meeting on exercise and heart disease. The year was 1968. Haskell's job was to collect research on maximum heart rate testing. All the experts agreed that exercise was important following a cardiac event or if you had heart disease. At the time, no one knew how hard a person should exercise following a heart attack. Haskell assembled the information and plotted the results on a graph. He and Fox studied the graph and discovered a pattern. By drawing a line through the data points, Haskell found that the maximum heart rate at the intervals of 20 years, 40 years and 60 years, was 220 minus the age. Haskell and Fox presented their finding at scientific meetings in Tel Aviv and Tuxedo Park, New York. In 1971, they published their formula that was to become the gold standard for exercise.

The problem with their discovery was the studies were done only on men all under the age of sixty who did not exercise regularly. Haskell and Fox did not actually perform any research. They compiled data from existing studies. So, their formula was not valid for all people. For a valid study, the results must be true in other places, with other people and at other times. Since Fox and Haskell's work was only on men under the age of sixty, the formula was then only valid for sedentary men under the age of sixty.
Haskell and Fox's formula is not accurate though for someone who exercises regularly. If you are a woman, 40 years of age and use the formula to determine your maximum heart rate, you could be off by up to 30 beats per minute. In most cases, you will exercise at an intensity that is too low. The same is true if you are 65 years of age and exercise regularly. The number guiding you is misleading you.

The best and most accurate method is a stress test with a cardiologist standing next to you

MHR

It is possible to estimate your exercise intensity as a percentage of VO2 Max from your training heart rate. David Swain (1994) and his US based research team using statistical procedures examined the relationship between %MHR and %VO2 Max. Their results led to the following regression equation :

* %MHR = 0.64 × %VO2 Max + 37

Yep, that is way simpler!

Palpitations were not mentioned

Not by the original poster ,but PWD did bring up the possibility that he may be experiencing some cardiac difficulty.

From what I've read and from training myself with a Polar Heart Monitor, most people push too hard during aerobic training and could benefit from going a little easier on them selves.The idea that if training hard is good then training harder must be better does not hold true.
I'd recommend the Polar Range of monitors for training as they are very accurate and as long as your not running in a "pack" and picking up others monitors they are useful tools.

Supercell

windowgazer wrote:

But since increasing the cardio part my body can still be very tired when I go to bed at 10-10.30. Also, sometimes my heart can still be beating strongly when I try to drift off so it is affecting my sleep.

windowgazer, I am very overweight at the moment but reducing and recently have been doing pretty intense cardio and never ever had this experience..when the excercise ends..my heart slows down ..as should everyones heart to the best of my knowledge (fit or not )

I strongly suggest you see a doctor for professional advise, I most definately would if this was happening to me.

windowgazer

Thanks everyone for their advice. I'm going to pop along to my GP and also bring down the intensity of my session.