You may have heard or read that the best way to monitor the intensity of your workout in pregnancy is to keep your heart rate at 140 beats per minute or less, but how would you feel if I told you that this practice would at best give you an ineffective workout and at worst put you at risk of high-blood pressure, fainting and overheating?
The rule of sticking to 140 BPM is an outdated measure of monitoring exercise intensity during pregnancy. Here's why...
Heart rate during pregnancy is not an accurate measure of how hard the body is working because the relationship between heart rate and exercise intensity varies greatly from early pregnancy to mid-pregnancy to late pregnancy. Changes in exercise parameters, duration of session, the type of exercise, how hard it feels, the vascular system, oxygen consumption and fetal heart rate response, all impact what the target heart rate should be.
So, by example, very fit women in the last 10 weeks of pregnancy will struggle to get their heart rate up to the target 140BPM without working very, very hard. Therefore, prescribing a standard target heart rate formula as a safety measure is unwise.
So, how should you monitor your workout?
The best and safest measure by far is the BORG Rating Of Perceived Exertion Scale. This scale measures how hard YOU PERCEIVE YOU ARE WORKING and is therefore subjective and responsive to your state of wellbeing on any given day.
The BORG Scale runs from 1-10 with 1 being no exertion whatsoever to 10 being working flat-out at 100% intensity.
Pregnant women should be exercising at between 5 and 7 on the scale, with 7 being "working somewhat hard".
For a full copy of the scale visit BORG SCALE FOR PREGNANCY and scroll down. The document link is on the left hand side of the page.
For your chance to have your pregnancy health and fitness questions answered, post your comment on my blog, or email me at
Nisha@the9monthclub.com
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