Pulling this one from an earlier episode with Zack Kelly, who works with athletes and everyday clients at Totum and did his master’s research on heart rate variability.
If you’ve got a Whoop, an Oura ring, or any wearable that tracks HRV, this one’s worth watching. Zack breaks down what HRV is actually measuring, it comes down to your vagus nerve and how well your body shifts into rest and recovery mode, and then gets into something a lot of people get wrong: a higher score isn’t automatically a better one. He explains why an unusually high HRV reading can sometimes mean your body is working hard to fight something off rather than fully recovered, and why looking at your trend over weeks or months tells you a lot more than any single day’s number. He closes out with the practical side, the things that actually move his own HRV, and it’s a pretty relatable list.
🎧 Listen to the Totum Wellness Podcast: