The average person sits in a chair with a resting heart rate of somewhere between 60-70 beats per minute (bpm). The standing heart rate increases slightly from this number, and the heart rate decreases when laying down. Why? The more muscles that have to work to maintain posture, move you around, etc. require the heart to pump more blood.

How do you feel when you’re resting? Do you feel truly relaxed, or do you feel somewhat tense, anxious, or jittery. Chances are, you’re not as relaxed as you think you are.

Invest in a Heart Rate Monitor, if you haven't already

The result of my recent focus on increased conditioning has dropped my heart rate significantly. Now, my Dad is a world class runner and from him I inherited good genetics, but nonetheless, my increased workload has yielded me a very noticeable benefit just sitting around my house. What is this benefit? I can barely tell I’m alive at times.

Let me explain. My heart rate laying down ranges from 47-49. Sitting from 51-55. Standing from 54-60 (standing is highly variable, as virtually any movement makes your heart rate rise). When I reach these levels, as I do when I get into shape, everything in my body feels calm, relaxed, and barely moving. I barely breathe, my heart barely beats, and everything in my body just feels relaxed in a way that almost seems unnatural. It feels great, like the way you feel when you just get out of a cold pool. But why does this wonderful side effect occur?

When your heart gets stronger via an increase in conditioning (this DOES NOT have to mean sustained cardio, which I DO NOT recommend), stroke volume increases, meaning your heart pumps more blood with each beat. This means that while running, lifting, sleeping, or cooking eggs, your heart doesn’t have to work as hard to do the same job. This means you don’t get that out of breath feeling, muscle tension, or a need to take deep breaths (your lungs also become more efficient at extraction oxygen from each breath).

Would anyone covet your heart?

So, you stand around and your body gets everything it needs from tiny, shallow, intermittent breaths (just like you practice at the end of yoga classes when you get 5 minutes to relax) with a heart that barely beats, and shoulders that sit comfortably back. It’s really a nice feeling to not have that muscle tension that accompanies a heart that is working overtime just to maintain life.

Get out and work hard and see how you feel. If you’re just starting out, then 2-3 days per week will make a big dent in lower that heart rate. If you’re already in good shape, then you will need to either up your intensity, volume, or both to keep moving toward your best heart rate. And don’t forget! High intensity interval training is the BEST way to shed fat and increase cardiovascular capacity – not sustained cardio done on those (worthless) elliptical machines, treadmills and the like. If you need a refresher on my views of machines, check back later on this week for my rant on why treadmill running is a waste of time, especially if you want a better butt.

Think this guy has a decent fastball? I doubt it.

Many coaches subscribe to the notion that “good” workouts end with their pitchers exhausted and on the verge of vomiting. Again, this is pure, unadulterated crap. The only thing these types of workouts are good for is breaking down the muscles in a pitcher’s legs and making them weaker. Good trainers and coaches will prescribe exercises that challenge the athlete but never make them ill.

Another thing to watch out for as a pitcher is overtraining, which is “a physical, behavioral and emotional condition that occurs when the volume and intensity of an individual’s exercise exceeds their recovery capacity.” Essentially, your body is unable to recover fully in between bouts of exercise. This means you will plateau in your fitness gains and eventually will lose strength.

I saw the effects of overtraining firsthand last season among the pitchers on my team. As a team, we usually only got one day off every two weeks. In addition to practice and games, we would also meet as a team 2-3 times a week to lift weights. And of course, there was the pitchers’ conditioning. This conditioning took place after literally every practice and game, and consisted of nothing but long-distance running (poles, loop around campus, etc.) As the season progressed, our pitchers were getting more and more run-down and were suffering on the mound as a result. Towards the end of the season, velocities were decreasing and ERAs were soaring. Of course, to the coaches this meant that the pitchers needed to be punished by doing the very thing that had led to their problems: more running. With ignorant training philosophies such as this, we were doomed to fail in postseason play.

If your coaches require pitchers to do ungodly amounts of running, you should try to get them to do some reading about the harm that it can cause. You don’t want to piss your coach off though, so be polite and discreet about it and you may be able to get him to change his mind about the effectiveness of sustained aerobic exercise.

For more information, Dan has already written about how to effectively train as a pitcher here: A Few Words About Pitchers’ Conditioning