Bioforce indicator is green but score is still way low

[akqjt]

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So here is what my Bioforce HRV screen looked like this morning. Quick history: as you can see on Monday I woke up in amber. I had done some HRI sprints on Sunday but I felt okay on Monday morning so I went to jiujitsu practice anyway. Unfortunately in practice we had some "king of the hill" type drills and I ended up doing a bunch of really hard rounds because my ego meant I was refusing to let people pass my guard. Big mistake. I felt like absolute dog poop for the rest of the day and the next day and even got a little sick. You can see it in the red score of 44 the next day, the lowest I've ever had.

I obviously took the next day off completely then woke up back in the green. This surprised me because I still didn't feel 100% upon waking up in the morning and the HRV score of 63 is still way below my typical scores in the high 70s.

What do you do on days like this? In the book it says that you can have a big HRV jump but get a red or amber and you should heed the warning. And in another thread, Joel says "the key to HRV is understanding that changes too low or too high indicate reduced readiness." But here is a case where there is a big change upwards -- but not enough to get to my usual levels -- yet I am getting the green light to push hard. Thoughts? How hard should one push on days like this?

[incrediblechap]

I'm no expert- but I'll offer an opinion. The indicator is one of readiness- and readiness is not just red/amber/green. There are differing values within each state. if you use the Bioforce Testing site you'll note there is a readiness scale from 1-10. I would imagine that the day of rest got you up to a high level of readiness for training, where you could do the normal workload but it would probably "dent" you more the next day rather than if you had your regular state of readiness. Continuing to use a 1-10 scale- lets say your readiness is at 8 and you proceed with your normal training- the next day you might drop to 6-7. If your readiness had been at 10 and you did the same workout maybe you would see a drop of 8-9. Depending where you are in your training plan will help you dictate what training load to use. If you have a series of "light" workouts coming up, I would hit it hard. if you have a "high" session coming up then maybe you'll want to adjust the volume or intensity down a little. Just my .02

[markh]

In my understanding using HRV doesn't preclude having a good work/rest plan. It simply tells whether your plan is working for you or overloading you. You should have some sort of a high/low split happening anyway and the HRV scores should "Average up" not go up every time. In other words, green means go, so do what you had planned and don't be conservative. Orange means be conservative and red means rest. If you keep getting lower scores over time then your exercise program has some problem with it. It looks like you are overtraining or under training from the negative trends on the graph but Bioforce can't help you balance your schedule it can only tell you if the schedule is hitting your body in the right direction. If you have a lower trend I'd look at your overall volume and see if it's too high or too low and work from that. It sounds too high if you are getting sick but it also could be too high intensity and too low volume. I've seen guys immune systems crumble when they only train 3 days a week and go hard for 3hrs with guys who trained 6 days a week for the last 3 years in Thailand.

[JoeShoco]

Hi guys,

Im in the same I seem to be on a downward spiral since I started using the HRV, I've just recently opened a new gym and have been slightly more stressed than usual I suppose, but I seem to be getting results with my program as in Getting stronger and hitting new PR's etc., So I'm a bit lost as in what to do but clearly as the graph would suggest something needs to be addressed,Any ideas or suggestions? I've posted my scores in excel also. Thanks

[Joel]

You need to post more about what your program and everything else has looked like the last three months. Clearly your HRV has gone down, but remember it'll correlate most well to aerobic fitness, not really as much to strength and power. You may very well be getting stronger and losing aerobic fitness and combined with the additionals stress of opening a gym, you could be getting less sleep, eating worse, etc. and that'll all have a negative impact on HRV. Tell us more about your training program over the last three months and what kind of PRs your hitting and how your aerobic fitness has changed over the last three months as you've seen your HRV go down as well as what your resting HR has done over those last three months as well and I can give you more answers.