What Needs to Shift?

Most people only think about their heart rate when it's fast.

During a workout. After a sprint. Before a stressful meeting.

But your resting heart rate (RHR)—how fast your heart beats when you're doing absolutely nothing—plays a different game.

🟢 A low resting heart rate is proof your heart has grown strong enough to do more with each beat.

🔴 A high one is a sign that it’s compensating for weakness with speed.

A resting heart at 75 beats per minute (bpm) feels identical to someone at 55. Same energy, same symptoms (none), same daily experience. That gap isn't just "how they're wired". It’s the difference between a heart that’s working overtime, while the other is built for longevity.

Over just a few months, it quietly adds up to a few million extra heartbeats. And while you won't feel those extra beats, they're rewriting the script for how well you age.

Every Beat Counts

At first glance, it seems trivial. A few extra beats? A small tax your heart pays that seems barely worth noticing. Who cares?

Turns out, your mortality risk does.

• Every 10 bpm increase in resting heart rate = 9% higher risk of death.^1* 

• RHR >75 = double the mortality risk compared to those under 55 bpm.^2**

• Each 1 bpm increase over 10 years = 3% higher risk of death. Your trend matters as much as your number.² 

• In twin studies (average age 62), the one with the higher RHR died first more often, even with identical genes. >90 bpm = 56% higher mortality vs 61–70 bpm. This makes resting heart rate an independent marker of longevity.^{3^}

The damage isn’t just future-based. Higher RHR today means increased risk of heart failure and cancer death.^{4† 5‡}

The worst part? Your heart keeps its complaints to itself and works overtime in silence. A high RHR  won’t trigger labour violations or union strikes. 

It won’t send alerts.

❌ No shortness of breath.

❌ No tightness in your chest.

❌ Nothing to signal that your heart is putting in extra shifts. 

It labors endlessly in the dark, until one day…without notice, it punches out forever.

Rating Your Resting Heart Rate

Below 60 bpm? You're building margin.

Above that? You're burning it.

While the graph shows typical ranges, anything above 60 is your heart's yellow light flashing. The lower you go, the more future you’re banking.

I've lived above 60 myself before I fine-tuned my training. These days my RHR averages between 55-58, hunting sub-55 by year's end. My current focus is patching weak spots in strength and power, but I still decode every signal. Your heart doesn't pause its audit just because you're focused elsewhere.

What Drives Your Resting Heart Rate?

It usually comes down to two time frames.  One plays out over days, the other over months of consistent work.

📈 Daily Waves

When your RHR spikes 5-10 beats for a few days or weeks, that's stress, poor sleep, or inadequate recovery saying: ‘I’m stretched too thin’.  This is your body’s early warning system—a tap on the shoulder from within.

📉 Running Costs

Even if you’re zen and sleep like a baby, a resting heart rate in the 60s and 70s for months tells a deeper truth. Not about your day or your week, but about capacity—how hard your heart must work just to keep you breathing.

Each extra beat shows your heart is compensating for fundamental weakness; working harder because it hasn't been built stronger. That ability doesn't change overnight. It’s responding to the capacity you’ve trained for…or neglected.

And capacity only builds one way.

A more efficient heart is earned through months of cardiovascular conditioning that forces it to get stronger. That’s not a feeling. It’s anatomical remodelling.

With consistent low-intensity cardiovascular training, your heart does what any muscle does when challenged. It adapts.

• The left chamber stretches, remodels, and strengthens🫀

• This allows it to pump more blood per beat 📈

• Which means fewer beats are needed to deliver the same amount of blood 📉

• What once took 65 beats now gets done in 60 🎯

This is why athletes often have resting heart rates in the 40s and low 50s.

So, while stress and recovery determine whether your RHR wobbles over days to weeks, your monthly baseline reveals the long-term physiological interest rate you're paying just to stay alive.

And modern life rarely demands a better rate…until you can't afford the payments. 💸

A poor resting heart rate doesn't shout. But in the absence of an alarm bell, don't mistake silence for safety.

Your Next Move

🔍 First, Let Your Smartwatch Do the Detective Work

• Your smartwatch or fitness tracker will quietly catch your heart rate during sleep or extended quiet moments.

• Wear it consistently (especially during sleep).

• Note: Apple Watch catches resting heart rate while awake, while Garmin and WHOOP measure during deep sleep—running 20-30% lower.

⚠️ Temporary Spikes?

2-5 bpm spikes over days to weeks? They're usually about stress and recovery. It reflects an audit of your recent life choices: 

• Poor sleep (yes, Netflix counts) 🥱

• Stress (your body doesn't care if it's "good" stress) 🧠

• That extra glass of wine 🍷

• Eating within 3 hours of bedtime 🍽️

Your heart keeps receipts of your daily choices. Use it as a recovery cue, not a cause for panic. Breathwork helps. So does meditation and sleep.

🫀 Consistently High?

You don’t need to obsess over every beat. But if your RHR is sitting in the high 60s or climbing over months? That’s not just stress or recovery. That's your heart's performance review, showing you what it can (and can’t) do.

• You can’t out-meditate this.

• You can’t out-recover this.

• There's only one path: progressive cardiovascular training. It must receive what every muscle needs—the right type of stress, consistently applied.

📉 Lower Your Operating Cost

The most powerful lever for improving your resting heart rate is low-intensity steady state cardiovascular conditioning (previously discussed, also referred to as zone 2 training).

• Incline walking on a treadmill (4-5% grade)

• Easy cycling

• Slow outdoor runs

⚡Pace Test: You can talk, but it’ll feel annoying to do so. Constant pace. Not stop and go. 

📅 Frequency: 30-60 minutes per session, 2-3 times per week. 

💰Pay-off: 2-5 bpm lower RHR in 3-6 months^6§. Yes, that's months, not days. You're remodelling your heart, not giving yourself a dopamine hit. 

Your Shift In Review

• Know the difference. Temporary spikes = stress or poor recovery. RHR >60 month after month = your heart is undertrained for the job.

• Each extra beat isn’t free. Every 10 bpm increase = 9% higher risk of death.

• You won’t feel a high RHR. But your heart pays the price in silence.

• The most effective action is months of low-intensity (zone 2) cardiovascular conditioning to structurally remodel your heart.