How to use HRV tracking to measure overall health

So, you have been consistently working out for six months and are starting to notice a plateau in results. Maybe in the first few months of consistent training, you started using heavier weights week after week, fit into your clothes better, noticed an improvement in capacity for longer-duration workouts, etc. I remember listening to a strength coach named Dan John on a podcast, and he said, "The best training program is the one you are not on". I understood that statement because our bodies adapt to whatever we do consistently, so it is important to vary training variables like exercise selection, workout intensity and total amount of work/volume. How someone tracks their results from a training program can vary from person to person. Some want to feel better, some want to experience the endorphins after a hard workout, some want to get stronger, some want to fit into old clothes they wore in their twenties and so forth. Regardless of the specific fitness goals people have, one important metric to determine the impact a training program is having on overall health is heart rate variability (HRV).

One caveat before I get into what HRV is all about

It is important to know that tracking something like HRV is best done consistently over time. When we measure once, we don't learn anything about a person. There is no such thing as a good or bad HRV score. Everyone is different, and it is important not to get caught up comparing your score with someone else, especially if you have only been tracking it for a short period of time. The only way to get a true picture of your normal HRV range is to track it over time. When you start tracking your HRV, view your score as your signature for your overall health that it is specific to you. Generally, after several weeks of tracking HRV, you will determine your normal range, and you can start to notice whether your score is trending upward or downward. The absolute HRV scores you will find online for certain age groups are to be considered but are not necessarily specific to you and your body. All this to say, many things impact the HRV score, which is why consistent tracking is necessary.

The only way to get a true picture of your normal HRV range is to track it over time.

Okay, so how does HRV work?

An HRV score quantifies the timing between consecutive heartbeats. The time between each heartbeat is the R-R interval, and this interval is influenced by how we respond to stress. When we face a stressor, physical or emotional, our body responds automatically. Things like our blood pressure, blood glucose levels, heart rate, etc., are controlled by the autonomic nervous system and automatically respond to a situation before we have time to think about what happened. The autonomic nervous system has two major branches: the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS). As the SNS turns on, the R-R interval shortens, and as the PNS turns on, the R-R interval lengthens. The SNS is triggered during workouts, and the PNS is triggered when relaxed and at rest. Energy distributed between these two branches of the autonomic nervous system is what HRV is telling us. HRV shows us how our body distributes energy and manages the environment it is put in, whether the body is in a stressed-out state (sympathetic) or a recovered state (parasympathetic).

So you need to know that in a sympathetic state, the heart rate will show up more rhythmic with less variability, versus when the body is in a parasympathetic state, the heart rate will show more variability. In other words, a high HRV score does not come just from hard training. What impacts your HRV score is how well you can recover from bouts of stress. It is important to remember that lifestyle stress greatly impacts the body and can leave people wondering why they are not progressing in the gym even though they have consistently hit the training floor for months with little to show for all the hard work.

What impacts your HRV score is how well you can recover from bouts of stress.

For most of us, our gains from training are lost due to poor recovery strategies. There are many ways to slip your body into a parasympathetic state, which is relatively simple. Although simple, it is not easy to build the habits that will allow your body to slip into rest and recovery—more on how to stimulate the PNS in a moment. When we track HRV consistently over time, we can start to uncover trends related to lifestyle and training. We may notice every Monday, the HRV score is high, and then by Thursday, it starts to drop by 10-20 points. Trends like this will help influence training. For instance, if Thursday is generally lower than Monday, it might be worth doing higher-intensity work on Mondays and sticking to steady-state exercise on Thursdays. Both lifestyle and training impact the HRV score, and this can provide valuable insight into how someone is responding to life and training stress.

Valuable insights an HRV Score can provide:

• Shows level of fatigue and overtraining

• Indicates aerobic fitness levels

• Been shown to predict overall life expectancy

• Inflammatory markers

• Visceral fat

• Insulin sensitivity

• Performance

Here are a few more important insights and reasons for incorporating HRV tracking into your health and longevity pursuits.

Standardize the test:

There are a lot of bio trackers and wearables out there, and I have had the privilege of using some of the top trackers on the market. The bio trackers I currently use are the Oura Ring and the Morpheus heart rate monitor. Aside from learning from Joel Jameson, the founder of Morpheus, I have no affiliation with either of these companies, and I intend to give a practical guide for using an HRV score to influence training.

How your HRV is measured matters, which is why I like the Morpheus tracker. I use the Morpheus chest strap heart rate monitor connected to the free app to measure my HRV. I try to do the HRV test before my morning coffee and before I start any work. I find this way of measuring HRV more valuable than the reading I get from the Oura ring. The reason is that I can standardize the test with Morpheus doing it every morning before I start my day, versus with Oura, the score is more of a random snapshot taken at night while I am asleep. Important to note: try not to compare your HRV score between multiple systems. Pick one system and track trends within that one system over time.

HRV score is a predictor of recovery:

A low score does not mean you cannot train hard or are destined to have a shitty day. Training on a day with a low HRV score will likely take longer to fully recover from that training day than it would if you went into the session with a higher HRV score. On the other hand, a high score does not mean you will have a record-breaking session. Your HRV score is an indicator of where your overall recovery is at and gives a window into how well your nervous system has bounced back from the previous day. Modern life can be very stressful on the human system, especially considering that most of our technologies are fighting for our attention. Stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system is quite simple and will help improve recovery from day-to-day life. Lengthening the exhale is a direct way to stimulate the PNS, and one quick sequence is trying to breathe no more than six times a minute. One long breath will positively impact your physiology, and when you do the long, intentional breaths for 10-20 minutes, you can have a massive impact on your overall state.

Health and longevity:

Tracking consistently over time is better than just randomly checking your HRV score. Your average HRV score tracked over time (1 year or more) can be a great marker for overall health. Below is some data collected by Joel Jameson and from his users on the Morpheus app.

As you age, your ability to recover and adapt decreases. The classic “ah, I am just getting old” is real, but you can still do something about it and slow the aging process. The good news is that HRV is trainable, and Joel found those in the age group 60-69 with an HRV score in the top 10% of that age group are above 80, which is the average HRV of someone 12-19 years of age. This shows we can train our HRV and continue to recover and adapt from stress. With health and longevity as the focus, we can use long-term HRV tracking to identify trends to see fitness changes over time.

How to use HRV to guide training:

Snapshot of what the Morpheus app looks like—photo taken from the bioforce certified conditioning coach course.

Once you have tracked HRV for several weeks, you can use your HRV score to guide your training. Working out is a stressor on your body, and your HRV status before you even hit the gym floor can determine whether your body is ready and recovered enough to get the most out of a workout. Using HRV, we can manipulate the timing of a specific stressor to match the trainee's readiness. When the HRV score is in the normal range for that specific person, there is a higher chance of reaping the intended physiological benefits of that hard workout. If the HRV score is below the normal baseline, you can still train hard, but you will likely need a few more days to recover fully from a hard workout with a low HRV score. Your HRV score is like a bank account; if you continue to withdraw when funds are low, it will take longer to restore the account balance. As I mentioned earlier, altering your training intensity and volume will help mitigate the onset of overtraining symptoms like irritability, brain fog, raised blood pressure, increased resting heart rate, increased soreness, etc. Lastly, no need to live and die by your HRV score. When I rely too heavily and obsess over my HRV score, I stop tracking it for a few months. Data is great to have, but ultimately, it is important to stop tracking the data if you are being consumed by it. Sometimes, I even gather the data for several days but try not to look at the values. I journal during that time and record perceived exertion during my workouts, and then, at the end of the week, I will look back to discover any trends.

Long-term tracking of HRV can indicate the effectiveness of a training program and how well your body is managing day-to-day stress. Remember to stay human and only incorporate bio-tracking after establishing a routine. If you are up all night multiple times a week, drink alcohol regularly, stressed from a busy work schedule and or battling a sickness, you do not need an HRV score to tell you the state of your body. Master the basics of taking good care of your health, and when healthy habits are established, it is worth considering HRV tracking.

I hope this helped clear the mud of what HRV is and how to apply it. If you have any questions or want to know more, email me at buildfitness@r-jtraining.com