Just came back from a doctor's visit. My pulse was 59. An interesting thing is
that I have only been swimming with the team for about 7 weeks and do about 3600 yds. I'm just over 50, by the way.
So, how does this compare?
40’s when I wake up. Sometimes use morning pulse to judge my stress. It can be in the 50’s mornings after tough workouts or after a flu shot. I’m not sure if my max goes over 175 now
I think I tell this story every several years but I’m not sure but I had a similar experience to Dan’s. While being treated for a pit viper bite while at the hospital I was hooked up to this obnoxious machine that reports your heart rate. It had this low heart alarm setting which would beep loudly when the pulse dropped below 35 or something. One effect of the snake venom other than tissue damage was respiratory depression, and in addition to the hydromrphone, and having a slow resting pulse in the first place, whenever I fell asleep I would be awakened by this obnoxious alarm. The nurses would initially run in and I would have to explain, each shift, each different staff what was going on. I eventually muffled the sound and remember finally getting some real rest, then I’m awakened by panicking night shift nurses thinking I was dead. After a few days I just turned it off, but then someone turned it back on.
I've had a mechanical aortic valve for 18 years. I had no restrictions on my activities and after 10-12 years of triathlon training my resting heart rate had dropped to 47 bpm. Over that time period my heart had remapped itself as an enlarged athlete's heart.
About two years ago as a side effect of having the mechanical valve, I started to develop atrioventricular block that in turn led to bradycardia (low heart rate) where my heart was stuck at 38 bpm.
I got a pacemaker implanted a year ago that now keeps me at a minimum of 55 bpm. The pacemaker has a motion sensor and pulse generator with software that is adjustable and I've had it fine-tuned a couple of times to respond a little better to my swimming. It's been challenging figuring out how long or hard my warm-ups need to be in order to get and keep my HR in the desired range, particularly at swim meets.
