To know if you are in your fat burning heart rate or not, you have to figure out your correct heart rate for training is. There are two different methods to do this with. Once you have your numbers, it is a matter of just working out to achieve the heart rate that you are shooting to stay within.
The fastest and easiest way to figure out what your heart rate range is to take your age and subtract (for men 220) or (for women 226) to get your maximum heart rate for training. Now to get the range that you want to train in, you take your maximum heart rate and take 60 percent of it to get your lowest rate and then take 70 percent of that maximum heart rate to get your maximum fat burning heart rate.
A more accurate heart rate calculation would be to use the Karvonen formula to figure your minimum and maximum heart rates with. To do this you have to find out what your resting heart rate is. The best way to do this is to find your heart rate for 3 mornings. Then take the average of them to get a good number for your resting heart rate.
To find your heart rate in the morning, you should do this before you even get out of bed. You have to find your pause and count how many times that your heart beats. While counting you will have to watch a clock. I would suggest that you count for 30 seconds and then take that number and multiply it by two to get your resting heart rate per minimum beat. Do this for 3 mornings in a row.
Once you have taken your resting heart rate 3 morning, add those 3 numbers up and then divide that number by 3 to give you your average resting heart rate. Take 220 (men and women) and subtract your age from it. This number will be your absolute maximum heart rate.
Take this number and subtract your resting heart rate from it. This will give you your heart rate range. Take your heart rate range and multiply it by the percentages that you want to train in. For maximum fat burning this would be 60 to 70 percent. You will have a low and a higher number. For each of these numbers just add your resting heart rate average to them to get the range of heartbeats per minute to stay within for your training.
By using the Karvonen formula, you are taking into account how good of physical shape that you are in. The better shape that a person is in, will determine how fast your resting heart rate is. The slower rates show up in people that are in good physical shape. The higher numbers will show out of shape people. The older a person is, will also help to raise the resting beat per minute too.
The range of only 60 to 70 percent of your heart rate will give you the highest percentage of fat burning. This is also without over taxing the body and making your muscle sore. With time, you will have to work harder to maintain your target heart rate, due to your body becoming conditioned and using oxygen more efficiently. However, if you want to burn the most fat for the work, you can use 60 to 70 percent of your maximum heart rate for you Fat Burning heart rate
