Need some help!

Hey all,

I am on a bulking cycle right now I am 5 feet 6 inches and am close to 190 right now. My question is regaurding heart rate. Seems my resting heart rate can be as high as 97 at times. This is in the normal range I suppose and I am kind of a fat ass right now here is the problem though. I hope I am not alone. When lifting like I am right now I am finding that i am failing from getting dizzy as opposed to muscle failure. Forinstance I am doing rock bottom squats on leg day. I put on 225 and do two sets of 6-8. I am finding I cant continue because I feel like I am going to pass out. After each set my heart rate is up to like 150-160 and take about 4-5 mins to get back down. Have any of you had any issues like this?

Thanks
Brette

Brette, get to a doctor for a checkup. A year or so ago, I had a resting heart rate of 90, which caused my doc to raise an eyebrow and say, “Get thee to a gym and doest some cardio!” A year later, my resting heart rate is below 60.

Muscular strength and cardiovascular fitness are two different things. You’ve got some stuff going on there that needs some attention, and you may very well be due for a stress test.

Whatever you do, don’t start doing cardio until you get into a doc! Good luck to you!!!

97 is far from normal…

The average resting heart rate for men is around 72 bpm and for women is around 76 bpm. Now for athletes such as us :wink: it should probably be more like 60-65. Although many people on this board oppose doing cardio, I would suggest doing 3-4 sessions of light cardio a week, for between 15-20 minutes per session. 97 is way too high and with the added muscle and fat from your bulking cycle your heart probably isn’t very happy with you right now. I’d also watch the amount of caffeine you’re getting right now and stay away from ephedra based products. Seeing a doctor might not be a bad idea either.

Hey all,

Thanks for the help. I went to the doctor and they did an ekg in fact 2 of them. They said it looked fine and are not concerend becasue my heart rate is within the range 60-100… And I am having no pain. So I guess I am going just start adding some light cardio in for 15 mins after my work outs. Any insight on where I should keep my heart rate?

60-70% of your Max Heart Rate is good. Rough estimate of MHR is 220 - age.

You mentioned a year ago you had a resting heart rate of 90. Can you tell me what kind of approach you took?

Bliss/Brette, I’m an advocate of two different types of cardio; HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) and longer duration, moderate intensity cardio. I’ve been doing a lot of the longer duration caradio of late (fasted state) because it raises HSL (Hormone Sensitive Lipase), a fat mobilizing hormone. But I feel that it’s the former that brought down my heart rate when I started doing it a year ago.

Do a search of the forum for HIIT using the search engine on the left hand side of the screen. For its cardiovascular benefits, you wouldn’t need to do it more than 3 or 4 days a week (the days you don’t work out), for no more than 25 minutes. That 25 minutes includes 5 minutes of warmup and 20 minutes of intervals. The way I do HIIT is 30 seconds very, very fast (pedal to the metal; as fast as you can) and 90 seconds SLOW, for recovery, to catch your breath.

You’ll burn fat and build a more comprehensive capillary network, which will help you in your workouts. Better delivery of nutrients to the muscles and better removal of waste/lactic acid.

It does not matter whether you walk-run or use a treadmill, eliptical trainer (easy on the joints!), StairMaster, or a rowing machine. It’s the concept more than the piece of equipment you use.

Brette, I agree with rasmns. That’s a great range to start with. After a while, when you start the HIIT, you’ll find that you spike your HR up to (and maybe even above) your MHR. MHR is calculated by subtracting your age from 220.

Start slow and ease yourself into things.

Just another point. A high resting heart rate can indicate overtraining.

That’s my two cents.

How old are you dude, we really need to know this shit before we are to recommend any sort of whatever!!!

Sorry I did not mention it I am 26 still a young dude.

Done some monitoring it seems that my resting heart rate is about 84 most times. It rises after I eat to >= 90. Also it seems something as simple as getting out of chair is enough to get it in the 90’s. I had some ekg’s done all looked ok the docs said. Next thing to check is the thyroid, In the mean time I am cutting caffine out as I am a junkie. And my trainer/diet guy is taking me off my buklking cycle and putting me on a maitenence program and adding little cardio.

starting weight 175 been slowing gaining since my last cutting cycle where was at 154 not quite 10% BF. I added about 20 lbs to get to 175 and started the mag-10 cycle. My meals were as follows.

1)odos oil 17 grams of fat 50 grams protein
work out
2)50 grams protein 100 grams carbs 1 serving cretine
3)50 grams protein 90 grams carbs
4) 80 carbs 50 protein
5)8 red meat 21 grams fat 80 protein
6)50 protein 15 fat
7)middle night 50 protein odos oils 17 grams of fat

I am up to 185 now after a 2 week mag-10 cycle. I am till gaining now. I have been off mag-10 for a week now and my heart rate is back is getting better. I am not sure if this had any impact on that or not though.

Bliss, you asked for my thoughts on your Mag-10 cycle. The results look good. You said you haven’t gained any weight and that you’re eating 5K a day. But from your post, it looks like you went from 175 to 185 in two weeks. What am I missing, or where am I confused?