{"id":801091,"date":"2026-07-14T10:22:19","date_gmt":"2026-07-14T10:22:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/801091\/"},"modified":"2026-07-14T10:22:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-14T10:22:19","slug":"from-27bpm-to-185bpm-how-a-cyclists-heart-rate-evolves-during-the-tour-de-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/801091\/","title":{"rendered":"From 27bpm to 185bpm: How a cyclist\u2019s heart rate evolves during the Tour de France"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe reason the Tour de France<\/a> is one of the hardest sporting events in the world is that we race in the peak of summer and it\u2019s all about attrition,\u201d Luke Durbridge of Jayco<\/a>-AlUla, veteran of 12 Tours, says.<\/p>\n

Three weeks of intense racing<\/a>, often under the baking hot sun, provides a thrilling spectacle, but it also poses dangers for the 184 riders: injuries, illnesses, burnout and more severe issues such as cardiovascular problems<\/a> can afflict them.<\/p>\n

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In the past decade, WorldTour riders Nathan Hooydonck <\/a>(Jumbo-Visma<\/a>, 2023), Wesley Kreder<\/a> (Cofidis, 2023) and Sonny Colbrelli (<\/a>Bahrain-Victorious, 2022) have all suffered cardiac arrests and been forced to retire prematurely from cycling. Others, including Elia Viviani (Cofidis, 2021), Zden\u011bk \u0160tybar <\/a>(Deceuninck Quick-Step, 2021) and Peter Sagan (Pierre Baguette, 2024)<\/a>, have detected problems and had minor heart surgery. Sam Bennett, the Tour\u2019s 2020 green jersey winner, also had a heart scare recently<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Tour de France cyclists are some of the fittest athletes on the planet \u2013 but what they do is not normal. They require close medical attention to ensure that they\u2019re not pushing beyond their limits. At the start of every season, riders undergo a mandatory heart examination, while additional check-ups take place periodically. Just like the general population at large, cyclists cannot take any chances with their heart.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d say that only checking your heart once a year is not enough,\u201d explains Netcompany-Ineos<\/a>\u2019s former world champion Micha\u0142 Kwiatkowski. \u201cThat\u2019s what happened in the past but with all the daily checking now I feel much safer. The last thing we want is to not wake up in the morning after not being diagnosed with something.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Sonny\n<\/p>\n

Sonny Colbrelli was forced to retire from cycling just six months after winning Paris-Roubaix<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

A reasonably fit amateur male athlete has, according to the fitness tracker platform Whoop<\/a>, an average resting heart rate (RHR) of 57 beats per minute (bpm); the average for women, who typically have a slightly higher heart rate than men, is 61.<\/p>\n

A Tour de France cyclist\u2019s RHR is even lower.<\/p>\n

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Cycling Weekly spoke with around a dozen riders at the 2026 race, and the common consensus was that the average RHR of a professional cyclist is between 33 and 37bpm. Some are closer to 50, but others are much, much lower.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve heard rumours of one rider having a resting heart rate of 27,\u201d says Pinarello Q36.5<\/a>\u2019s Damien Howson. Jan-Niklas Drost, director of health and performance at Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe<\/a>, corroborates those figures. \u201cI\u2019ve seen below 30,\u201d he says. \u201cFor the normal population that would be too low, but these athletes are used to it and it\u2019s something we do see.\u201d<\/p>\n

It does not always correlate, however, that lower is better. \u201cI can get as low as 36 on days I\u2019m really rested, but that doesn\u2019t mean I\u2019ll perform well the next day,\u201d Bahrain-Victorious\u2019s Matej Mohori\u010d tells Cycling Weekly. \u201cAll of my best performances have been in the last week of a Grand Tour when my body is significantly fatigued but it leads to great endurance performance. Last night [stage five of the Tour] my heart rate was 44, but I\u2019m pretty sure in the last week it won\u2019t go below 50.\u201d<\/p>\n

What to read next<\/p>\n

Just as a rider\u2019s physical and mental state evolves during a three-week race, so too does the functioning of their heart. Durbridge explains: \u201cMy maximum heart rate is 185bpm, but already in the leadout [on stage five] my maximum peak was 164bpm. I\u2019ve done final day time trials in the Tour and gone full gas, aiming for a top-10, and averaged 145bpm at threshold. It\u2019s just the way the engine goes \u2013 you get more efficient.\u201d<\/p>\n

Howson reports the same trend. \u201cAs the race goes on, fatigue creeps into the body and the biggest difference I notice is how my maximum heart rate drops by around 20bpm between stages one and 21,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m pretty confident that by stage 19 or 20 I won\u2019t get over 170bpm anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Tour\n<\/p>\n

A time trial effort sees a rider approach their maximum heart rate<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

As has been well documented,<\/a> the first week of the 2026 Tour has been blighted by record high temperatures, conditions that affect a rider\u2019s heart rate. As an imperfect rule of thumb<\/a>, for every degree the body\u2019s core temperature increases, the heart rate rises by 10bpm. In a sport where significant demand is already placed on the heart through intense exercise, the additional heat is another stress.<\/p>\n

Riders wear heart rate straps during a race, while various wearables measure a rider\u2019s pulse 24 hours a day. Another measurement that has become increasingly popular in recent years is heart rate variability (HRV) which tracks beat-to-beat changes in one-thousandths of a second.<\/p>\n

A higher HRV is typically associated with better health and fitness, while a lower HRV can be expected when the body is more physically or mentally stressed \u2013 often as a consequence of illness, day\u2013to-day life or exercise.<\/p>\n

Kwiatkowski notes that \u201con hot days most of the guys in the bunch have lower HRVs.\u201d But the riders CW canvassed at the Tour all reported that, except for small differences registered on the more fatiguing days, HRV stays relatively stable during a Grand Tour.<\/p>\n

Not everyone is as fixated on their cardiac function, though. Both Marco Haller of Tudor Pro Cycling and Cees Bol of Decathlon<\/a> CMA CGM say that they don\u2019t monitor their heart rate as it\u2019s just one extra data point among many that risks overwhelming them.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t even wear a heart rate belt when I\u2019m racing,\u201d Haller says. \u201cI know that in the heat it\u2019s a big stress for the heart and the overall system, but if I tell Pogi to slow down <\/a>because my heart rate is too high, he won\u2019t listen anyway so what\u2019s the point!\u201d<\/p>\n

Bol voices a similar, if less frivolous point. \u201cOften it\u2019s quite obvious: if you\u2019re sick, you know you\u2019re sick; and if you\u2019re feeling good, you can feel it. I don\u2019t think they [heart rate monitors] are accurate enough for anything else in the middle.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Tour\n<\/p>\n

The UCI mandates every professional bike rider to sit annual cardiac screening<\/p>\n

(Image credit: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

The aforementioned cardiac cases can make it seem like there\u2019s a trend of more and more top-level cyclists having heart complications. But Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe\u2019s Drost warns against reading too much into such incidents: \u201cThe ratio is still quite low compared to the amount of athletes and I think everybody has a good awareness of it in this sport.\u201d<\/p>\n

Drost explains that the main cause of heart conditions are due to genetics and illnesses, which then get exposed during sport: \u201cThe reason why something happens can vary, but it\u2019s often related to genetics and events, such as infections.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe also know there are certain types of stresses that can lead to problems so it\u2019s super important to educate everyone. If someone is having palpitations or whatever, there would be a fast follow-up with a cardiologist to see if there\u2019s something we need to react to and monitor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cycling\u2019s governing body, the UCI, mandates all professional riders to sit an annual cardiac test <\/a>which consists of an ECG and a cardiovascular risk questionnaire.<\/p>\n

Teams, including Drost\u2019s Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe, take additional measures, including putting all riders and staff through CPR training in the off-season. \u201cIt makes them not feel helpless in what would be a stressful situation as they practice at least once a year,\u201d Drost says.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen a rider first enters the team, they have a full cardiac assessment \u2013 we don\u2019t only do what the UCI recommends,\u201d Drost adds. \u201cIf there\u2019s an indication that there\u2019s an issue, we do a long-term ECG, of seven days or more, to get a better understanding. There are also mobile devices that can track the heart for three months.<\/p>\n

\u201cEvery heart is different, so we have individualised follow-ups. That\u2019s once a year for every athlete, but for some it\u2019s every six or three months.\u201d<\/p>\n

Drost clarifies why taking such precautions is necessary. \u201cWe know that, in general, endurance sport is beneficial for the cardiovascular system, but this is not normal endurance sport, and there are extreme conditions like the heat we have at the Tour de France and extreme load.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe cardiac system adapts to that: the heart gets bigger and there are minor changes in how it acts and how blood is pushed out. And that\u2019s why we need a good, consistent monitoring system.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kwiatkowski for one is grateful to the level of support and care: \u201dYou probably hear more about heart problems but that comes from the fact that we\u2019re checking our heart more often, with wearables and sleep trackers. I\u2019m just glad that we\u2019re doing sport and getting these checks.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a particularly pertinent topic for Mohori\u010d who was a teammate of Colbrelli who retired after collapsing at the 2022 Volta a Catalunya. \u201cWe\u2019re really mindful of it in our team because of the experience with Sonny,\u201d the Slovenian says.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m still not sure if what we do is more or less healthy than the alternatives but personally I put a lot of emphasis on it. I don\u2019t just do the UCI mandatory checks \u2013 every year I do a cardiac MRI with contrast so I can be really sure that my heart is in good health. It costs a bit of extra money but it\u2019s important to invest in yourself and not be surprised by anything as you never know.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThe reason the Tour de France is one of the hardest sporting events in the world is that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":801092,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[445],"tags":[49,48,635,82],"class_list":["post-801091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/801091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=801091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/801091\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/801092"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=801091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=801091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=801091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}