The Fat Burning Zone Heart Rate Calculator

So let’s do a flash back to about 5 years ago.  I’m studying to take my personal training exam and I come across a section that completely dumbfounded me. It was the fat burning zone.The book, which was written by prestigious doctors and that such, said that to optimally burn fat you want to train the in the “fat burning zone” which is about 60-65% your maximum heart rate.  And after I read this I was like “what the hell?”




And I even remember seeing the little signs on the cardio equipment at the gym that had the same thing on them — I was confused if this was real or a fat burning zone myth?

Because when I train at only 65% of my maximum heart rate, I’ll BARELY be sweating and then when they tell me that when I work my butt off (getting up to 90% my maximum heart rate) I’m not burning as much fat?  Hogwash!

So I wanted to dig a little deeper and find out what REALLY is going on with this fat burning heart rate zone.  It turns out that it’s completely true…with a HUGE BUT.  The “but” is that even though you are burning more calories from fat as a percentage at that heart rate zone you’re actually not burning nearly as many overall calories that you would be from doing higher intensity workouts, and therefore you’ll burn more calories from fat.

This really struck me as kind of a scam because you see this weight loss heart rate zone rubbish thrown all over everywhere and you see people doing nothing but the elliptical at the gym with their headphones on and watching TV.  And you’re telling me they’re doing the best method for burning fat…yeah right.

Now the best way, I’ve been saying all along, is to do HIIT which stands for high intensity interval training.  You’ll burn 900% more fat (it’s science!) and you’ll keep burning fat long after you’re done working out.  It’s called EPOC, which stands for Excess post-exercise oxygen consumption which is basically the body burning calories while trying to recover from such a strenuous HIIT workout, and this NEVER happens when you do steady-state cardio.

When you’re doing HIIT training you’re going to want to have periods of high intensity and follow it with some recovery time. 

What I want you to now focus on is getting a heart rate monitor and doing periods of high intensity interval training until you’re heart rate reaches 90% of your maximum heart rate (MHR).  Once you reach it you’re going to want to recovery until your heart rate gets back down to 60% of your MHR.

When you’re recovering you can jog or just try to walk it off.  The lower intensity you go on the recovery period, the quicker you’ll recover.  And once your heart rate reaches 60% you can go right back to kicking your arse and going hardcore until you reach that 90% heart rate…and trust me it WON’T be easy.

The heart rate method isn’t perfect but it’s much more accurate than just doing timed sets.  Once you’ve been playing around with the HIIT heart zone training, you can get a feel for how long it takes you to recover and perform to get your targeted heart rates.  After you have determined the times you can go ahead and implement the timed sets into your workout (and not always have to use a heart rate monitor).

So how do you find out where your heart rate should be?  Funny you should ask because I created an easy to use fat burning zone heart rate calculator that I want to give to you for free.  All you need is Microsoft Excel or a similar program to use it.  Click the link below to download the calculator.

Heart Rate Calculator

The Fat Burning Zone Heart Rate Calculator

To find out your Resting Heart Rate just count how many times your heart beats for 60 seconds either first thing in the morning or after you’ve rested for a while.  Then just use the calculator and plug it in!

And to finish off, some thoughts on different styles of HIIT for you to consider.  Stay off the ellipticals and bikes (unless you have joint problems) and get to running, swimming, metabolic conditioning, boot camp workouts, weight training, bodyweight workouts and other much more effective methods.  This type of training is a heck of a lot more fun and you’ll get CRAZY results when you start doing this stuff effectively.
Once you combine this training with an effective nutrition program you’ll see those rapid fat loss results that you want.  You’ll get ripped fast and have a lean body quicker than you thought possible…not because of hype but because it’s science.