Healthy

So, back in July I had these weird heart palpitations and PVC's going on that the Doc couldn't explain, plus an occasional pain in my chest during higher heartrates. They did some tests and ran some numbers, checked here, checked there... nothing. The final step to make sure I wasn't having some hidden heart thing, was to schedule me for an Echocardiogram on a recumbent bike, which is attached to a table. Yesterday was the day. I showed up, they shaved my chest, plugged me into 12 wires and then 5 more for something else and then had me lay flat on my back while I pedaled a recumbent bike. It was somewhat relaxing and I thought, "wow, with one of these I could pedal myself to sleep at night!"..

At any rate, the test was 20 minutes long and the machine slowly adds resistance until I get my heartrate to 140. At that point, the table I was laying on, is supposed to rotate onto the left side while they do an Ultrasound of my heart.

10 minutes went by, then 15 etc. while I kept a steady cadence. They started getting concerned because my heartrate wasn't getting above 120 and they needed 140 for the Ultrasound to be accurate. During the last minute of the test they both stood up and said "we need you to sprint or the machine is going to shut off and we'll have to start over". The table turned at the 20 minute mark, but I was still about 130, I sprinted and finally got my heartrate to about 144. No big deal.

The nurse and the Echo specialist said that I went down in history as the only person they have seen actually beat the machine. Typically, most people get to 140 within the first 10-12 minutes.

So, test done. The nurse said that the results will officially go to the cardiologist for review, but that she thought everything looked "fabulous" in her words.

I beat the machine. Now I can go on about my training with a little peace of mind that my inner-piston is worthy of the higher RPMs.

wheels of love make the world go round.

-papa