The hearts ability to pump blood around the body to your muscles is incredibly important. The important red blood corpuscles transport oxygen to your muscles. The more red blood corpuscles your heart can pump round the body per. pulse beat, the better your muscles can perform.

At the same time, this will also mean that in the event of a given strain, a heart that pumps a lot of oxygen per. pulse beat must work less than a heart, which does not pump so much oxygen per. pulse beat. One always measures per. pulse beat per. minute. That is the number of pulse beats your heart beats per. minute at any given strain.

Therefore it is very important to challenge your heart. Like you challenge your muscles with max. output. Also the heart compensates for the big strain by improving its capacity in your resting periods. In this way your heart prepares itself to handle even tougher strains next time in exactly the same way you challenge your muscles with interval training, as described in the lesson about interval training.

You achieve the following advantages by goal-orientated training concerning your pulse:

• A lower resting pulse
• A lower pulse/minute at any given strain.
• A wider working zone
• The ability to work closer to your boundaries of your pulse for a longer period of time.
• A minimizing of your recovery time.
• As with all types of “aid” to improve your training effort, there are always advantages and disadvantages. The advantages of training your heart into achieving a greater capacity are obvious, but can be achieved without the use of a heart rate monitor.