What's up with my HR?

[aaaaady]

Hi there,

I have a question. The last few weeks my rest heart rate was pretty stable at low 50's. However, the past few days, despite me exercising the rest heart bpm is going up (from 52 to 54/55). What is the cause of this? Should I take extra rest? Or does it have to do that it was my birthday this week and fitbit calculates the rest bpm now differently? 

Furthermore, the last few days I see in the charts that when I am asleep, around 1am my rest bpm drops to lower than 40 (somewhere around 37-39bpm) for an hour (however it is not a part of deep sleep according to fitbit)

and than spikes back to more normal values. What is the reason of this drop in rest bpm and why is not lowering my average rest bpm?

Hope someone can help,

Thanks in advance!

[Dominique]

A variation of 2-3 bpm (either way) in RHR is perfectly normal IMO. It could be wider and still be no reason for concern.

As to variations in HR during sleep, they’re also normal. And there’s a reason why RHR reported by Fitbit isn’t the absolute lowest HR which you usually see during sleep.

Maybe your overthinking it (e.g. trying to match deep sleep with HR) is causing stress, which resulted in the slightly higher RHR you observed.

As to the impact of exercising, cardio fitness score would be a better way to assess it than mere RHR.

Summa summarum: focus on having an active lifestyle and eating a healthy diet, and don’t overthink tiny fluctuations in RHR or drops in HR during sleep.

[aaaaady]

Thanks for your answer. It helps a lot. I think my main concern here is that I am unable to lower my rhr. My cardio score is at a constant 59 (very good). For some reason I am not able to improve this. Do I have a higher rhr because I am officially a year older since last week (and perhaps the algorithm calculates that diffently) or can I stop the upward rest bpm trend somehow (exercisinv these days almost every day but it varies between very intensive and very moderate)?

[Dominique]

Why do you want to further improve your cardio fitness score if it’s already very good? Are you involved in competitive endurance sports (running marathons, competing in triathlon etc.)? If you are mostly interested in being fit and healthy, you could just focus on maintaining your current level. Same with RHR: it’s already low as it is, what additional benefits would you get pushing it even lower? Maybe you should focus on your weaker points instead, if any: could you lose a few pounds / becoming leaner, becoming stronger etc.?

I don’t think being one year older makes any difference in the way the cardio fitness score is calculated.

[gerasik]

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