Famine day #4: Decreased HR!!! What to do

AxPoZak · Post by **AxPoZak** » Thu Sep 20, 2012 11:24 am

Its late morning of Day #4 of famine, and both my am and pm heart rates for the last two days have been 2-4 bpm LOWER than average. Has anyone else experienced this? I'm pretty worried that I am going to pre-maturely enter the feast phase before my body is alarmed.

INFO: I've been following the rules of famine pretty strictly, with an average daily calorie intake of 1558, and protein intake 32 g (around 85% of the protein intake is literally coming from the 1-2 grams per serving of veggie or fruit). My weight is down 6 lbs in 3 full days, going from 218 lbs to 212. I've been following the outlined workouts, as well as adding in some additional isolation movements (making sure to decrease rest/increase volume each successive day). Also, I've been adding 40-60 minutes of cardio on "off days".

EFFECTS THAT I'VE NOTICED: decreased energy; feeling weaker when in gym; desire to sleep longer; when lying in bed at night it feels like my heart is beating harder, just not faster.

One thing to note is that through out this process I've been using a Heart Rate monitor application on my phone, however it is generally very accurate. If no one has had any similar experiences I will probably buy some of the urinary test sticks for protein excretion to know for sure before I move to feast. However I'm foggy on what an alarm-positive test result would look like... there would be a high amount of protein in the urine, correct (signifying muscle breakdown)? I'd REALLY appreciate an answer to this question or any advice I can get regarding the issue I'm having. Thanks a lot.

aron7awol · Post by **aron7awol** » Thu Sep 20, 2012 11:30 am

I wouldn't worry about it. You've only completed 3 days of the 5, and in my experience it's these last two days where your heart rate will increase the most.

AxPoZak · Post by **AxPoZak** » Thu Sep 20, 2012 1:27 pm

Okay thanks, I'll keep that in mind. I guess my worry is mostly due to the fact that it actually decreased from the average, as opposed to just hasn't increased yet.
Also, apparently I'm SOL on the urine testing strips. I called all the drug stores around where I live and NONE of them sell those damn things. The closest they have is a ketone tester. I think its too late to order them online as well, since tomorrow is day 5 and I'd rather not spend the extra 20$ for overnight shipping. Should have planned better.

Slicknic05 · Post by **Slicknic05** » Fri Sep 21, 2012 5:52 am

same here man, my heart rate in my 3rd day was 78 from 72. in my 4th day and 5th day it decreased dramatically. from 78 to 66. but i guess its okay cause i accomplished the goal. to lose 1lb per day. started from 165lbs to 160.

aron7awol · Post by **aron7awol** » Fri Sep 21, 2012 8:59 am

Slicknic05 wrote:same here man, my heart rate in my 3rd day was 78 from 72. in my 4th day and 5th day it decreased dramatically. from 78 to 66. but i guess its okay cause i accomplished the goal. to lose 1lb per day. started from 165lbs to 160.

Strange, were you possibly overtrained going into famine?

AxPoZak · Post by **AxPoZak** » Fri Sep 21, 2012 11:57 am

Morning of day 5 and HR is still decreased. Last night my pm HR was pretty close to average, but this morning my resting HR was still 4 bpm below ave. I do have a pretty slow pulse to begin with (average is 45 bpm), but I dont see why that would matter. The one thing I do have going for me is that I've already lost 7 lbs, but personally I feel like heart rate and urine tests are by far better indicators of an alarmed state than simply weight loss is. I'm in no way an expert (or even particularly knowledgeable), but my thinking is that its easy to lose weight on a diet, but that doesn't necessarily indicated a state alarm. Short of urine tests, I read that a "foam" in your urine could indicate protein excretion, but its difficult to tell.

In an effort to further stress the body, yesterday I decreased caloric intake to between 5-6 times body weight and suppressed protein consumption to around 20 g. I'll do the same today. I'll probably continue as planned, and begin feasting tomorrow, unless anyone has any bright ideas.

aron7awol · Post by **aron7awol** » Fri Sep 21, 2012 3:07 pm

I have Multistix and have never seen anything above a trace of protein excretion in my multiple tests during 3 different famines. I think my Multistix may be defective, because I have certainly smelled the difference in my urine during day 4/5 of famine, and noticed a cloudiness to the urine at the same time.

My only thought as far as your reduced heart rate would be that if you were overtrained going directly into famine, you may not see the elevated heart rate. Obviously, I have no idea if you were overtrained or not, just throwing a theoretical reason for it out there...

AxPoZak · Post by **AxPoZak** » Fri Sep 21, 2012 6:07 pm

aron7awol wrote:I have Multistix and have never seen anything above a trace of protein excretion in my multiple tests during 3 different famines. I think my Multistix may be defective, because I have certainly smelled the difference in my urine during day 4/5 of famine, and noticed a cloudiness to the urine at the same time.

My only thought as far as your reduced heart rate would be that if you were overtrained going directly into famine, you may not see the elevated heart rate. Obviously, I have no idea if you were overtrained or not, just throwing a theoretical reason for it out there...

Yea thats a good point, I thought about that as well and I wish that was it so I could fix it next time. However I don't think its that easy though because I did take a full 5 days of rest before starting. It may also be possible (but unlikely) that I was over trained before going in to the rest phase, so the average HR I took was actually elevated in the first place. I feel like even that is unlikely because other that some rotator cuff issues, I definitely was not experiencing any of the common symptoms of over training (ie lack of energy to train, sickness, trouble sleeping).

On the positive side, I think I may have noticed that cloudy pee you mentioned... not yellow, just kind-of a light grey translucency. Also, looking in the mirror I have lost some muscle mass, so at least some catabolic effects have been going on. Hopefully by tomorrow morning my HR will miraculously increase by 12 bpm, but if not, then oh well.

Dragon · Post by **Dragon** » Fri Sep 21, 2012 6:14 pm

Yeah. I've noticed more believable results from just buying all the dependant variables on just one stick, for example I use a single product to test pH and another one for protein.

AxPoZak · Post by **AxPoZak** » Fri Sep 21, 2012 6:17 pm

Actually I had another thought. One of my worries before starting the run was whether or not the famine week workouts would be enough to shock my system... that worry went away after experiencing just how hungry I've been all week. But going back to that, in your experience have your muscles been overly sore after completing each of the three famine workouts? Because to be honest, I haven't experienced any muscle soreness whatsoever, other than in my legs from the squatting, which is to be expected because I usually use a leg sled/leg press. Just a thought.

aron7awol · Post by **aron7awol** » Fri Sep 21, 2012 7:49 pm

I do tend to get at least a little sore after my famine workouts, which is significant because I pretty much do not get sore at all during feast or cruise.

I wouldn't worry too much. Your diet and workouts appear to be spot on, and the most important part of famine is the lack of protein. I think you can be pretty confident you've succeeded in shocking your body in that aspect at least.

AxPoZak · Post by **AxPoZak** » Fri Sep 21, 2012 9:05 pm

yea I agree. okay, thanks for the reassurance

wtmarcus · Post by **wtmarcus** » Sat Sep 22, 2012 3:58 am

EFFECTS THAT I'VE NOTICED: decreased energy; feeling weaker when in gym; desire to sleep longer; when lying in bed at night it feels like my heart is beating harder, just not faster.

Also you have dropped 6lbs in 3 days.

Sounds to me that you're doing just fine.

I wouldn't worry about the HR at all. For some HR is a great measurement, for others not so much. All part of the process of experimenting with what works for you. Here's my suggestion: Keep tracking your waking HR through the feast and cruise. Take a week off after the cruise maybe and keep tracking. Then hit a new famine and see how that goes. Maybe for you a drop in HR is a sign, maybe some unknown factors are messing it up this time around, etc.

Either way I'm sure you'll get excellent results from your run. Just don't panic about not hitting the target increase.. or actually do panic, that should bump it up.

Slicknic05 · Post by **Slicknic05** » Sat Sep 22, 2012 9:51 am

Strange, were you possibly overtrained going into famine?[/quote]

No, actually i have not been to the gym for a week before famine.