Hi, I am thinking of buying one of those watches which could be used as a heart rate monitor. Do you think it could be useful for my training or game? Or are you still using it and could tell me your opinion? Regards Nils
Heart rate monitors Hi Hierkommtnils, Heart rate monitors are excellent for informing you how much exertion you are subject to when you are training or playing games@Badminton (or any other sports). Usually people who use them are those; 1. Who do not want to exceed a certain heart beat rate (because of their bad heart condition), and 2. Who want to want to exceed a certain heart beat rate gradually over time (so that they can build up a healthier heart). When you are talking about the heart, medical doctors are the best people to consult. Cheers... chris@ccc ***
I wouldn't say it's particularly useful for a sport like badminton. Save your money to spend on something else.
It's an excellent tool, it's usually used for running/cycling. For example are the Garmin Forerunners. Hey, it doesn't hurt to get one, but then again you might want to save your money instead.
Just a few questions 1. Why do you want the monitor? Is there a medical issue behind this? Or is it just because you fancy it? 2. Do you train alone or with someone else? If the latter, is it a coach? 3. How often do you train/play? And, how long is a single session?
Well, you don't really need a heart rate monitor to tell you when your heart rate is high in a game, you feel it I find HR monitors to be excellent tools for training for a number of reasons: a) easy to keep track of times and how much "real" work time during training sessions. b) More accurate control of kcal consumption, to better adjust diet, proteing carbo intake. c) If you test lactate tresholds etc, you can use it as a tool to enusre you either work above or below lactate thresolds when training, shadowing etc. d) lots of fun if you like tech e) Doing intervall training can be more effective if based on more precise measurements where you wanna be at what pulse levels for what duration.. etc.. /Twobeer
He doesn't have a heart anymore He gave it away to badminton As the lovely Julia Ormond tells Harrison Ford in Sabrina: "They say you're the world's only living heart donor"
You might find this useful: http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/news/article.asp?UAN=496 Using a HRM with a chest band might not be a good idea for a badminton player. Remember that, unlike joggers and sprinters, your arms need to move up and down a lot when playing badminton... and the chest band will interfere with your movements. If you're not averse to counting out the money, one of those expensive strapless models would be good. There's one hitch though... most of the strapless models have a sleeve that goes on your index finger (of your non-racquet hand). But it will be annoying each time you hold the shuttle for a serve. It's easier for women... NuMetrex makes a special bra with a built-in HRM
There's also the biological interpretation of the data. % of max heart rate is correlated with % of V02Max for steady state aerobic activities. So, heart rate monitoring is essentially a cheap way to get %V02max data on your training for these types of activities. Badminton is an intermittent, anaerobic sport. Intermittent means that things are spread into periods of work and periods of rest. Furthermore the length of these intervals are not fixed. Trying to analyze this highly variable exertion with an average exertion method (V02max) is going to lead to very imprecise results. Anaerobic means that the level of exertion is very high. At that high intensity, is V02max an effective predictor of performance? Not really. V02max isn't even the best predictor of performance in aerobic sports (vV02max is better). So, the use of heart rate monitoring for badminton lies on a couple of weak connections to performance. That's why I don't recommend it. If you really want to measure heart rate, take a count between rallies. It is much cheaper that way. Also, keep in mind that badminton is a skill sport, as opposed to an physical sport. Physical sports performance is strongly dependent on the equation of: Work Capacity x Movement Efficiency x Power = Performance You can think of in terms of a gas tank and fuel efficiency. First of all you make sure you have enough of gas and fuel efficiency to get to where you want to go. Then you try to increase power so that you get there faster. In badminton, you don't really care about all that. It's not like in the middle of a rally, you'll just stop suddenly because you've "exceeded your energy quota for that rally". Energy systems work comes into play when you start running out of energy and it begins to affect your performance.
stumbling feet makes many good points, however: measuring your heart rate during training sessions is VERY useful. after working out your max heart rate (100 <-- for example) you can begin to work out how to effectively train. training within the "threshold" is very important if you want to see any real performance improvements. the threshold itself is between 60%-80% of your max. this means that while training if you can stay within this threshold for periods of time followed by periods of rest you will be able to effectively make progress. this will also result in quicker recovery time (getting back to your resting heart rate). this however is specific to cardiovascular work. (heart rate monitor) the threshold however can be used in all types of training. so i say it is very useful... for training purposes however i am only 16 years old and have taken p.e for AS level so my points may be slightly inaccurate... maybe stumbling feet can clarify the issue.
When I use it I use a Polar RS800 with soft chest-strap.. Works very well and works even for intense games.. Still got my heart but badminton will always be in it /T
What happened is that exercise physiologists looked at aerobic performance at different levels of intensities, and they found that when intensity increases past certain thresholds, the time which that intensity could be sustained dropped off severely. There are a couple of thresholds that are commonly used. The first one is when intensity increases to the point that fat can't provide energy quickly enough, so glycogen begins to be used. Some people reasoned that since fat burning during exercise is maximized at this point, training just below that threshold would allow the most fat to be burned during exercise. The next threshold is the one where the production of anaerobic by-products (like lactacte) exceeds the body's ability to get rid of them. So, you begin to accumulate these waste products which can quickly make it too tough for you to continue at the same intensity. Again, some people reasoned that since you can exercise much longer when below this lactate threshold, the best way to train your aerobic energy system would be to stay below this intensity level. Some problems exist with the above conclusions. First of all, this research was done with steady state exercise, and pretty much all non-endurance sports involve intervals of work and rest. Furthermore, in pretty much all non-endurance sports the work intervals are at an intensity above those two thresholds. For example, in any skill sport you move until the play is over, you don't stop when you reach some arbitrary submaximal level of exertion that someone told you to stay below. In training, you want to replicate the energy demands of your sport for best results, and steady state aerobics is quite dissimilar. That's why it's not all that great. Remember that physical training is to invoke an adaptation response in the body. Training + recovery = better performance. So, some physiologists with some good common sense decided to test out training responses of aerobic training lasting ~ 1 hour, high intensity interval training lasting ~20 minutes, and very high intensity interval training lasting ~4 minutes. It turns out that the training that stimulated the greatest adaptation was the very high intensity interval training. In fact, it had the greatest fat loss, the best improvement in aerobic ability, and the best improvement in anaerobic ability, despite having much less time spent during training in the "fat burning zone" or the "aerobic training zone". Makes you think eh?
