I Indoor cycle, what intensity is right?

Within the collective physical activities that can be found in gyms offer highlights the boom in indoor cycling, also known commercially as Spinning® (recorded by Madd Dog Athletics, Inc.), practiced mostly by Women whose main objective is the loss of body fat mass.

At present, they are quite settled the benefits of exercise on improving the level of fitness and disease prevention called hypo kinetic . So, if the physical practice is performed systematically, with a duration, intensity and proper recovery, as well as being adapted to the conditions and personal and individual characteristics .

The American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) recommended exercise intensity cardio respiratory endurance, from a physiological point of view, should be set between 60% and 90% of maximum heart rate (HR max), between 40% and 85% of heart rate reserve (HR reserve) or, based on psychological parameters such as perceived exertion between 12 and 16 points as the Borg scale.

Like most sports centers and fitness centers do not have a laboratory with specific equipment to control the intensity by oxygen consumption (VO2) , measuring heart rate through heart rate monitor and the methods of subjective perception effort could be the easiest way for prescription and (auto) control of the intensity at the facility. In this sense, the scale of subjective perception of effort -RPE- Borg is the most economical and used instrument.

Unearthing evaluated so far is to know whether there are statistically significant differences between men and women in the registered intensities; so for it and to determine whether the intensity of the predominant strain in the main phase of the session is established within the recommended by the ACSM with the aim of improving and maintaining cardio respiratory endurance parameters in addition to analyze the validity of the scale of subjective perception of effort Borg as a tool to control the intensity in indoor cycling, there have been those reached during this activity in 133 people (38 men and 95 women) aged between 22 and 64 years.

•             Heart rate was recorded every 5 seconds during the session, with a team of Polar telemetry Team System®.

•             The perceived exertion (RPE) was determined by the Borg scale of 15 points with 6 points ranging from "no effort" to 20 points "maximum effort". this scale was used because of its high correlation to heart rate.