Concept2 Forum

Seeking some advice or knowledge and advice on heart rate monitors for the PM5. I have been rowing for over a year and have not thought about using one until recently as I am beginning to train a lot more seriously. I have read a few posts and have done some research but felt the Concept2 community would be the best source of what to use and why. I am not opposed to a watch but would probably prefer a chest type strap or open to any suggestions. I want something that links effortlessly with the PM5 and has an app or system to store data. I am a novice on this subject, I am open to any and all advice and want to thank everyone in advance for their time and help.

Steve

Steve, welcome to the forum. Wrist HRM are inaccurate when used with a rower, so I've heard.

Stick with a chest strap or an optical arm band. I use a Polar OH1+ optical. Plenty accurate for me & connects to the PM5 reliably. Can be used with Polar Beats & Polar Flow apps. Able to store 12 hrs of workouts & battery is rechargeable.

Polar H10 is a chest strap monitor, extremely accurate. Stores one workout in memory. Slightly more expensive. Personally I find chest straps uncomfortable, & would have to launder the strap regularly as I sweat a lot.

The arm band monitor for me is more comfortable & convenient. My arms don't sweat, so strap needs less frequent laundering.

Purchased a Garmin HRM and chest strap in 2017. It still works. Also have an Apple Watch Series 5. It's as accurate as the Garmin and also reports heart rate recovery.

I use a USB stick so the HRM links instantly. The PM5 and Apple Watch don't communicate and never will, but I'm okay with that.

I use a CooSpo chest strap HR monitor mainly because it links up with the Polar Beat app, the Elite HRV app, it's cheap and reliable.

I have always used a chest strap, but I agree that i have heard wrist monitors aren't as reliable, and I don't know anyone who uses an arm strap.

Dangerscouse wrote: ↑

December 1st, 2020, 1:49 am

I use a CooSpo chest strap HR monitor mainly because it links up with the Polar Beat app, the Elite HRV app, it's cheap and reliable.

I have always used a chest strap, but I agree that i have heard wrist monitors aren't as reliable, and I don't know anyone who uses an arm strap.

Stu brings up a good point in favor of a chest strap. If you want to keep track of your heart rate variability, you'll need a HRM that can accurately track the R-R intervals of your cardiac complexes & not just average out the differences. I, myself, am not too familiar with this metric. Stu, how does this help out with your training?

mict450 wrote: ↑

December 1st, 2020, 2:38 am

Stu brings up a good point in favor of a chest strap. If you want to keep track of your heart rate variability, you'll need a HRM that can accurately track the R-R intervals of your cardiac complexes & not just average out the differences. I, myself, am not too familiar with this metric. Stu, how does this help out with your training?

I've only been using it for a couple of weeks, but you take a reading first thing in the morning and it tracks your 'readiness'. All last week it gave me readings of 8 or 9/10, and after my 28k on Saturday, I felt wiped out and sure enough it gave me a 2/10.

It's possibly borderline helpful. To all intents and purposes, it's arguably just telling me what I already know, but at the very least it's a subconscious mental boost when you see a higher reading and you're feeling tired, or a good reminder to stop you from training when you really know you shouldn't.

I'll know for sure if it's really useful when I get a high reading, but feel unmotivated & tired, and still manage to get a great result. I have had a lot of those days over the years, but I've never known my HRV, so it's a bit intriguing.

Dangerscouse wrote: ↑

December 1st, 2020, 4:25 am

I've only been using it for a couple of weeks, but you take a reading first thing in the morning and it tracks your 'readiness'. All last week it gave me readings of 8 or 9/10, and after my 28k on Saturday, I felt wiped out and sure enough it gave me a 2/10.

It's possibly borderline helpful. To all intents and purposes, it's arguably just telling me what I already know, but at the very least it's a subconscious mental boost when you see a higher reading and you're feeling tired, or a good reminder to stop you from training when you really know you shouldn't.

I'll know for sure if it's really useful when I get a high reading, but feel unmotivated & tired, and still manage to get a great result. I have had a lot of those days over the years, but I've never known my HRV, so it's a bit intriguing.

Interesting! So it sounds like it will monitor your state of recovery. I wonder how this compares to just monitoring your resting heart rate?

Getting an HRV app may be a worthwhile addition if one already has a chest HRM. Not an option for me, presently.

mict450 wrote: ↑

December 1st, 2020, 9:59 am

Interesting! So it sounds like it will monitor your state of recovery. I wonder how this compares to just monitoring your resting heart rate?

Getting an HRV app may be a worthwhile addition if one already has a chest HRM. Not an option for me, presently.

It also measures your RHR and when my readiness was 2/10 my RHR was the same as usual, and the same as when it registered 9/10. It gives you a relative balance score between Parasympathetic and Sympathetic systems so it does seem to add some additional information to the process, but obviously I'm not an expert so I don't know how useful it is.

It's possibly just another gimmick, and info overload, but it's an interesting experiment as it might turn out to be useful as it progresses, and all I have to do is remember to use it as soon as I get up for 2.5 minutes, so it's no hardship.

Dangerscouse wrote: ↑

December 1st, 2020, 11:08 am

It also measures your RHR and when my readiness was 2/10 my RHR was the same as usual, and the same as when it registered 9/10. It gives you a relative balance score between Parasympathetic and Sympathetic systems so it does seem to add some additional information to the process, but obviously I'm not an expert so I don't know how useful it is.

It's possibly just another gimmick, and info overload, but it's an interesting experiment as it might turn out to be useful as it progresses, and all I have to do is remember to use it as soon as I get up for 2.5 minutes, so it's no hardship.

So when low, you're supposed to back off with a light recovery workout or complete rest day?

Hmmmm.....I can get your CooSpo HRM for about $30 on Amazon....might be worth spending that much if....

When you think about it, please post some updates on how useful this metric is for you. This is starting to draw my interest. I'd better do some research. Thanks for this info, Stu.

mict450 wrote: ↑

December 1st, 2020, 12:49 pm

So when low, you're supposed to back off with a light recovery workout or complete rest day?

Hmmmm.....I can get your CooSpo HRM for about $30 on Amazon....might be worth spending that much if....

When you think about it, please post some updates on how useful this metric is for you. This is starting to draw my interest. I'd better do some research. Thanks for this info, Stu.

Yes mate, when it's low it suggests you consider active recovery, or a total rest day, and if it's higher, using your personal baseline of info, it will suggest that you can handle something a bit harder and you're able to handle more stress.

I think it's going to need a few more weeks until I've got a good idea of the benefits. The CooSpo is cheap, but it's been impressive. Connects very easily, and hasn't really given me any issues at all. I've been impressed.

My Garmin watch HRM is useless with the rower. I think it gets electrical interference from some part of the rower, as my HR is always 3 times my stroke rate - SR of 20 produces a reading of 60, 30 produces 90, etc.

Chest HRM is far more accurate, I've found - my old Garmin watch was separate chest strap, and I've paired that with my watch to produce far more accurate readings for timing HRR on intervals

Besides the Polar OH-1, there is the Polar M460 bike computer with the H10 chest sensor. The H10 connects with the PM3 and PM5 because of ANT+ connectivity. The M460 stores the data.
This combination may seem outrageous because it is double the price of an OH-1 . However, if you are also doing outdoor sports besides indoor rowing, like running, biking or hill walking, it is an attractice combination because the M460 has a GPS, a speed sensor and a barometric altitude sensor. There are options to mark lap times. It stores all data for a review with free Polar Flow software.

Below is a registration of my heart rate in a rowing session. As the M460 is not synchronized to the PM5, so I had to mark the start and finish of my row on the M460 (vertical lines 1 and 2).



I find the combination of M460 + H10 great value. It can do Heart Rate Variability measurements.

Dangerscouse wrote: ↑

December 1st, 2020, 1:49 am

I use a CooSpo chest strap HR monitor mainly because it links up with the Polar Beat app, the Elite HRV app, it's cheap and reliable.

I have always used a chest strap, but I agree that i have heard wrist monitors aren't as reliable, and I don't know anyone who uses an arm strap.

Sorry to jump on the thread, but I saw you mention HRV in another post and wondered what it was... is it this?
https://www.whoop.com/thelocker/heart-r ... ility-hrv/ ?


Back to the original post though, I use the OH1 arm strap on occasions. My arm sweats a lot but I just bung the strap in the washing machine inside a small draw string mesh bag and it has survived so far! Accuracy wise seems OK but don't have another HRM to compare it too. It does occasionally cycle down and back up again so you get a small dip in the trace but its good enough for me.

Dino wrote: ↑

December 1st, 2020, 8:24 pm

Sorry to jump on the thread, but I saw you mention HRV in another post and wondered what it was... is it this?
https://www.whoop.com/thelocker/heart-r ... ility-hrv/ ?

Yes mate, that's it. That's a good article as I'd forgotten some of the science behind it all.

Dangerscouse wrote: ↑

December 2nd, 2020, 10:50 am

Dino wrote: ↑

December 1st, 2020, 8:24 pm

Sorry to jump on the thread, but I saw you mention HRV in another post and wondered what it was... is it this?
https://www.whoop.com/thelocker/heart-r ... ility-hrv/ ?

Yes mate, that's it. That's a good article as I'd forgotten some of the science behind it all.

Cheers - it was an interesting read. I can see why people have jobs as sports scientists