Week 14: The Best Protocol for HRV Measurement
Why the Orthostatic Stressor is Best and How to Make it Practical
Hi there 👋
I hope everything is well.
Heart rate variability (HRV) is widely used to assess our stress response, recovery needs, and training adaptation. However, there are important considerations to make in relation to the best way to measure HRV for this specific application (i.e. for athletes of all levels).
Recent research (Gronwald et al. 2024) suggests that morning HRV is the more effective option, due to the orthostatic test.
In this blog, I will provide an overview of what the orthostatic test is and add practical tips to exploit this mechanism during your morning measurements without adding unnecessary complexity.
I was just having this same conversation with my co-authors for our upcoming “HRV book”, and I think it could be useful to the many people using our tools as well, hence I am elaborating on this here as well (as it will take a little longer to get that book done!).
Enjoy the read.
PA Chalk Up, Marco Altini, HRV Specialist #80
From Manny’s show notes:
Dr. Marco Altini is a data scientist, entrepreneur, and the creator of HRV4Training — an app used by athletes and coaches around the world to make smarter training decisions using heart rate variability and other physiological data. With a PhD in data science and a background in machine learning and wearable tech, Marco breaks down the science behind recovery, performance, and why your resting heart rate might be more important than your bench press. Whether you're a coach, athlete, or just a nerd for numbers — this one's for you.
Discount for HRV4Training Pro: 20% off 🖥️
HRV4Training Pro is the ultimate platform to help you analyze and interpret your physiological data, for individuals and teams.
You can find a guide and overview here.
Try HRV4Training Pro for free at HRVTraining.web.app or use promo code SCIENCE for 20% off.
While we really appreciate the pledges on Substack, our writing here will always remain free, and Pro is the best way to support our work.
I thank you for that.
When using Pro, the app will also automatically recognize your account and add the Normal Range to the Baseline view, together with detected trends and additional annotations, which can help contextualizing longer-term changes.
You will also be able to pick rMSSD as the parameter to see on the homepage of the app.
See you next week!
Marco holds a PhD cum laude in applied machine learning, a M.Sc. cum laude in computer science engineering, and a M.Sc. cum laude in human movement sciences and high-performance coaching. He is a certified Ultrarunning Coach.
Marco has published more than 50 papers and patents at the intersection between physiology, health, technology, and human performance.
He is co-founder of HRV4Training, Endurance Coach at Destination Unknown, advisor at Oura, guest lecturer at VU Amsterdam, and editor for IEEE Pervasive Computing Magazine. He loves running.
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