Have you ever struggled with wondering how hard you are working during a workout session? It can be confusing or difficult to figure out what exertion level to maintain throughout your exercise routine to ensure that you are burning the most fat or calories.

The Borg Scale of Perceived Exertion

Research has shown that the Borg Scale of Perceived Exertion is a good way to tell how hard you are working, as it correlates with your actual heart rate during physical activity. The relationship between a person’s perceived exertion rating times 10 and their actual heart rate during physical activity are such that a person’s exertion rating may provide a fairly good estimate of the actual heart rate during activity (Borg, 1998). For example, if a person’s rating of perceived exertion (RPE) is 12 (see below chart for scoring), then 12 x 10 = 120. The heart rate should be approximately 120 beats per minute. Note that this calculation is only an approximation of heart rate, and the actual heart rate can vary quite a bit depending on age, physical condition, and with medication. The Borg Rating of Perceived Exertion is the preferred method to assess intensity among those individuals who take medications that affect heart rate or pulse. This scale is used because despite the lack of variability in one’s heart rate when controlled by medications, exertion is still an experience felt and used to rate the amount of effort put towards the exercise bout. While doing physical activity, it is important to rate your own perception of exertion. This feeling should reflect how heavy and strenuous the exercise feels to you, combining all sensations and feelings of physical stress, effort, and fatigue. Do not let any one factor such as leg pain or shortness of breath be your focus, but try to sum your total feeling of exertion. Attempt to appraise your feeling of exertion as honestly as possible, without thinking about what the actual physical load is. Your own feeling of effort and exertion is important, not how it compares to other’s. Look at the scales and the expressions and then give a number. This will give you a good idea of the intensity level of your activity, and you can use this information to speed up or slow down your movements to reach your desired range.

How to Use the Scales to Gauge Your Workout

• A good warm up pace is around 10 to 11.
• Practitioners generally agree that perceived exertion ratings between 12 to 14 on the Borg Scale suggests that physical activity is being performed at a moderate level of intensity.
• Workouts done in the 15 to 18 range are your target for fat burning and cardio conditioning. If you cannot maintain this level of workout, consider interval training between moderate and more intense bouts of exercise. More evidence is showing that harder workouts actually contribute more to fat calories being burned than moderate to light exercise. They are finding that there is less of a “fat burning zone,” and more of a target effort that should be put forth towards an exercise bout to burn an optimal number of calories.
• Exercising at 19 or 20 on the scale cannot be maintained for very long because this is VO2 max and heart rate max. Even the best athletes can only reach this level in their workout for a limited period. Exercising up to and around this point will help you broaden your scale, and help you increase your VO2 max.



If you are better at the 1-10 rating systems, you can try to use this scale. It does not correspond to heart rate the same way that the Borg Scale does, but it can give you a good idea based on the percentage or ratio of your max effort.