MSI Press Blog

  The treadmill starts. My heart rate leaps—108 bpm almost instantly. I run. It climbs. 183 bpm at peak. Then the machine stops. I step off. And in the time it takes my feet to hit the floor, my heart rate drops like a ninja smoke bomb—50 bpm in 30 seconds. It’s fast. It’s dramatic. And it’s mine . 🧠 What’s Going On? Rapid heart rate rise : My body doesn’t ease into exertion—it launches . That’s not uncommon in highly responsive cardiovascular systems. Instant recovery : My parasympathetic nervous system (the “rest and digest” branch) kicks in fast. It’s like flipping a switch from battle mode to tea ceremony. Brief dizziness : I feel it for 5–10 seconds. Not alarming. Likely tied to sensory mismatch —my vision says “still moving,” my body says “we’ve stopped.” (I get carsick too. So yes, it’s probably a vestibular-visual disconnect .) 🧬 What My Doctors Say Postural hypotension (a sudden drop in blood pressure) can cause dizziness after exertion, but my heart’s structur...

As my fitness training intensifies, I find that I am as overwhelmed with math, as I was as a humanist, in math classes as a child. I got the "necesssary" A in all my courses, but I took only the routine high school college-prep math courses and nothing fancier. Sometiimes, numbers become completely meaningless. So, trying to put meaning into what is a good heart rate has become a nightmare of numbers rolling over me, of a cloud puffed high like a thunderhead, spewing showers of unrelated digits down upon me at night when the sorting out should happen during my sleeping hours, but it does not. This past week I was at a conference. The fitness center had little equipment other than treadmills. And, the treadnills had just too much information: BPM at 65% for each decade, ages 10-90 (guess not many centenarians find their way onto that moving belt) BPM at 80% for each decade). I had been operating with one figure, which is a comforting way of operating. No need to ...