RHR

Almost done with my time up here in Darwin, heading home tomorrow before getting ready for two weeks of annual leave. Fun times ahead.

Have to say not feeling particularly better, having nearly lost my voice, and having developed a bit of a cough on Wednesday. With a hoarse voice I think I probably sound worse than I feel, but I am not feeling super awesome either. Today and yesterday I also saw a jump in my resting HR which is usually a good sign that your body is fighting something. In my experience the HR usually jumps up before you start feeling poorly, whereas this time it was the other way around. Either way, the higher heart rate makes sense given how I am feeling.

Currently my resting heart rate (RHR for the cool kids at home) is about 41 and over the last couple of days this has jumped to 45, which is about enough of a change to indicate something is wrong. While I am not too bothered about wrist based heart rate monitors, this kind of constant tracking is one advantage that I am a fan of. For paranoid triathletes having this kind of monitoring can be very useful. Sure it has helped me confirm that I am not well this time around but in the past I have used it for the opposite, confirming that I am actually okay, even if I am feeling a little off. Triathletes are great ones for second guessing what they are feeling, am I sick, am I well, should I train, should I not, having an objective measure like heart rate tracking can help make that decision a little easier.

Now that the resting HR has gone up, it is just a case of waiting it out until it drops again only a matter of time really. If my cough and my general feeling of horribleness wasn't enough to convince me to keep resting, then the elevated HR would be.

Time for a solid sleep in.