In a gym you might have a blinking heart rate monitor that works out how hard your pushing yourself based on a simple equation of something like 0.70(220 - age). What this equation is doing is estimating your exertion. When such a test is done professionally the math involves your VO2 MAX, which has its own estimation test or can be measured by literally monitoring air in and air out during exercise.
Sound complex? What the Borg Scale allows you to do is a very fuzzy calculation which gives you enough feedback to do whats practical - speed up or slow down. The good news is all you need to do is either sing to yourself or talk to someone while you exercise when you want to check your exertion level, not all the time.
I want to say straight away that the twenty point scale, though more accurate, isn't very user friendly. There is little perceivable difference at a lot of the key points. A lot of people adapt it to a ten, or eleven including zero, point scale.
The new scale goes from sleeping (0) to fighting for your life your so intense (10). Most beneficial activity occurs between three and eight. In some sports, combat sports like Judo for example, there may be periods of 9-10 exertion but by definition these will be very short and unsustainable for the 20-30 minutes per day that we are looking for.
On the other side of things if you do all of your sessions at one and two, this would be activities like walking slowly around a supermarket or playing Wii Tennis for most people, you won't be using your time wisely. You should feel like spending hours doing an activity like this would be no hardship at all.
We work in three zones of the Borg Scale. Zone one is between three and four. This is what most people consider to be the beginning of exercise. It should be easy to sustain, cardiovascular, for the 30 minutes we require and in fact doing an hour at this pace shouldn't be daunting. It's important to remember that aches and pains as well as your mindset have an effect on how hard things seem - but these are not measured well by the Borg Scale. I'll talk about injury vs ache in a future post.
To be in zone one you should display three criteria. First you should be sweating lightly. Second you should be able to converse normally though your breathing may be more labored. Finally you should be able to think clearly and logically. In other words you should be able to sing along, get the words right and be a little sweaty.
Zone two is between five and six. This is what PE was to me at school - I tried and I was tired afterward but the rest of my day wasn't impacted by it. Again, cardiovascular, sustaining this for thirty minutes should be OK. If you are heavier and jogging for thirty minutes creates too many aches and pains try quick walking or riding a bike.
To be in zone two here are your criteria. First you should be sweating moderately, this is hard to judge but I find that when I'm sweating heavily I don't notice it so much because it's so pervasive. Second communication is limited to quick responses - your unlikely to say more than is necessary. Finally your thought processes should be clear - in fact your probably aware of a lot of thoughts at this point and your probably carefully trimming your responses. In other words your singing along to some lines and thinking the others in your head while sweating at a rate that makes you want to change when you get home.
Zone three is seven plus. I say seven plus because often the difference between seven, eight and nine for me is based on how much I enjoy the activity, how I'm feeling in my head and how long I've been at it. The point is you should feel like your putting everything into the session. Cardiovascular this level depends heavily on your general fitness, heart rate, lactate levels and VO2MAX. Remaining here is a state of mind. The sessions we do at this level are often interval-ed with a zone two component. This is the place however where your improvement is most noticeable and your successes make you most proud.
To be in zone three you should be displaying these traits. Sweating heavily. Unwilling to engage in dialogue, except maybe single words. You should be fixated on what your doing mentally - either from the angle of hating it and wanting it to end or from doing it and wanting it to end. Your probably only vaguely aware of the music at this point and singing along would make you laugh if you could only remember how.
As a rough breakdown we currently do six sessions per week. One in zone three, fifteen mins or so. One in zone one, thirty mins. Four in zone two, one of which lasts an hour the others are thirty mins. The less days you do the longer or more intense you should aim for. I hope that helps you decide when to speed up and when to slow down.
James
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