Polar f11 Can’t Be Beat
Polar f11
For someone who has to have detailed information about their exercise and training workouts, the Polar f11 simply can’t be beat. It’s attributes are unparalleled in the sport watches industry.
It is a strap on wrist device that is a stop watch, a watch and best of all it is the perfect personal training unit that includes a heart rate monitor, and it tells you how often, how long, and how hard your training routines should be.
The Polar f11 is a master piece of advanced technology that is almost like having a high priced personal trainer with you each and every time you exercise.
Who Should Use The Polar f11?
Whether you are training for a marathon, or just running to improve your overall health, the Polar f11 is the sport watch that will help you meet your fitness and training goals. If you are a serious competitor, if gives you that needed competitive edge, the one that will move you into the winners circle.
Many times, a athlete in training just doesn’t know how to improve his performance. He or she is at a loss as to what to do next, the Polar f11 takes the guess work out of what you need to do to take your performance to next level.
Features Of The Polar f11
The designers of the Polar f11 watch have thought of literally every possible eventual problem with this popular training device.
For example, because the f11 has become so popular with both training athletes and casual fitness participants, this device comes with a coded heart rate monitor, which prevents cross-signals from other similar Polar sport watches that might be in the same gym or nearby vicinity.
A chest strap tracking device is included with the Polar f11. It monitors your heart rate and sends the information directly to the sports watch itself. Any information that is captured by the f11 is easily transferable to the Polar website for storage and for tracking. You will always have access to the history of your workouts.
Polar f11 And Different Zones
The f11 sports watch is set up to accommodate three different exercise zones. For example, with this advanced technology, it is possible to set one zone to 150 to 170 heart beats per minute. The f11 notifies you of when you enter and leave this particular heart rate zone. This function of the Polar f11 tells you when to increase or decrease your activity so that you continue training within your chosen heart rate zone.
For more than thirty years, Polar has been manufacturing heart rate monitor sport watches for both the elite athlete in training and also for the average guy or gal wanting to stay in shape. The the Polar name is synonymous with high quality sports watches, and the design and technology of the Polar f11 makes it one of Polar’s top sport watch achievements.
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Sport Watch Essentials
Garmin Fitness Watch
So you’re shopping around for a new sport watch, and you’re basically overwhelmed by all the different choices that are on the market today. And, boy is there a plethora of choices out there.
It seems like every watch manufacturer in the world has jumped on the sport watch band wagon.
Maybe you’ve owned several sport watches over the years and have worn them all out one by one, or they’ve gotten broken or lost, and now it’s time to see what’s different about our modern sports watches.
Or, it could be that you’re shopping for gift, or maybe you’re trying to guide someone into buying the most suitable sport watch for you. Hey, I don’t blame you, might as well get the watch of your dreams, the one you really want, right?
What To Look For In A Sport Watch
Whatever the reason, the goal of this post is to help you quickly narrow down your sports watch choices to two or three and then you can go price shopping confident about the exact features you want on your new sport watch.
Don’t forget to shop the Internet, there are often terrific bargains there that you won’t find at your local mall, or jewelry store.
Admittedly there are many makes and models to choose from, but thankfully there aren’t nearly as many different types, brands, and model as there are with Wall Clocks. Many wall clocks are handmade or antique and you definitely need to educate yourself a bit more before you purchase one.
Back to sport watch essentials. The possible watch picks run from a simple inexpensive sport watch costing around or under $40 all the way up to a wrist mounted complicated computer, which only a sports scientist would know how to use.
If you choose to purchase the sophisticated wrist mounted computer type sport watch, you should be prepared to flatten your wallet to the point of laying out several hundred bucks, probably in excess of $500 – $600, not to mention that you’ll have to go back to school to learn how to operate the new expensive sports watch gadget you’ve just purchased.
Features Of A Good Sport Watch
When attempting to find the right sport watch for you, it is important to determine what your must-have, bare minimum criteria is for the time piece best suited for your particular life style and training needs.
First, think about what you will be using the watch for. For example, will you be running or swimming laps, doing interval training, or do you just need a simple stop watch function on the sports watch you choose?
Maybe you don’t actually need a sport watch with all the latest and greatest features. If a simple sport watch with just the three basic features is all you need, then you will be saving yourself a ton, and many of the less expensive ones are smart looking, durable, and function perfectly.
There are many sport watches manufacturers, and each one of them makes several different models with varying features to accommodate the different serious athletic training requirements for any particular sport, or, for that matter, the casual participant in any particular sport. As an example, people that just occasionally compete in fun runs often train on a regular basis.
Then, there are the millions of sport watch owners that just want a sport swatch for its sporty or casual look. They may be the outdoorsy type, or the guy or gal that likes to keep in shape by visiting the Gym or exercising at home, or he or she just might not be the type of person who likes to wear a dress or fancy watch. Most sport watch buyers fall into this category.
The Top Feature Used On A Sport Watch
While it is true that we generally think of sports watches being used to help you train in a particular sport, you will probably be surprised to know that the feature most used on today’s sport watch is the sport watch’s ability to monitor your heart rate.
Continuing sports science research has firmly proven that physical improvement and therefor sports athletic performance can be greatly enhanced and accelerated by maintaining different heart rate’s while advancing through the different workout phases.
These are called target heart rates. For example, an athlete in training, would regularly use his sport watch to monitor his or her heart rate during the warm up portion of his workout, but he would have an entirely different target heart rate for the main portion of his workout, and yet another target heart rate for his cool down phase.
An individual’s ability to monitor his heart rate during various phases of his workout was not possible until the sport watch became so economical and easily accessible worldwide. For this reason, many more young athletes have been afforded the opportunity to compete for high school, college, and even professional sports.
Not all sports watches are created equal, of course, and what would be a terrific sport watch for one person would be totally unacceptable for the next. Having said that, however, there are a few features that would usually be considered necessary in virtually every sport watch.
1. The chrono short for chrononmeter, the stopwatch function is the most important feature of any sport watch watch.
The chrono lets you to record your time whether you’re competing long runs, short competitive races, or swimming laps. Really, any physical activity that you’re trying to record your time in doing.
2. The digits on the face of the sport watch need to be clearly visible while moving and from an arm’s distance away. As obvious as this feature should be, many buyers tend to overlook this very important feature and end up with a sport watch that is difficult to read while on the move.
It is also an advantage, depending upon how serious you are as an athlete, if your sports watch lets you to view two or three data fields simultaneously and it wouldn’t hurt if it supported customizable screens. If you are a just casual athletic participant, these last mentioned features wouldn’t be necessary.
3. Session, recall, and lap storage. Even the casual athlete that trains only 2-3 times a week will want to make sure that their new sports training time piece has this capability.
Many sports watches have enough memory to store a session log including the individual laps or attempts of the session. And, the more advanced sport watches can even record the warm-up and recovery periods as well as the main part of the workout.
4. The Interval or Countdown feature allows you to count down to zero from any specified time.
A countdown timer features is exactly what it claims to be. It counts down to zero from a specified time. This particular feature allows you in repetition training to observe both timed attempts and timed recovery periods.
An interval timer on a sports watch is a series of varying length countdown timers that run in sequence. Depending on how you have it set, the session either repeats or stops when the last countdown timer in the sequence has run.
5. Some would consider a heart rate monitoring feature absolutely essential. Many good advanced sports watches feature a heart rate monitor, which does just what it says, it measures your heart rate in real time and displays it on the display.
Performance gain will be achieved if you’re exercising at a high enough heart rate intensity level (target heart range). Also,
in order to avoid over training and a poor response to you training it is good to be able your heart rate during the recovery phase of your session.
There are many more advanced features that are available on today’s more advanced sport watches. Some of them are speed and distance measurement, pace measurement, GPS function, and foot pods.
If cost is one of your considerations, be aware that these more advanced features will definitely add to the expense of the sports watch. It’s best to determine what you will actually be using your new watch for before you put down your hard earned money. Go over a typical workout in your mind and see which features you will be needing
With these essential features and suggestions in mind, you’ll be able to save yourself some time and also shopping headaches, and you will easily be select the sport watch that fits your individual training goals.
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Sports Watch Favorites
Timex Expedition Sports Watch
The invention of the sports watch has totally changed the way athletes train for virtually any sport. When I think about how sport watches have totally revolutionized athletic training, I’m just completely blown away.
Sports training of the past required the athlete to carry a stop watch, or have someone train with him to carry the watch and push the start and stop button. And, the stop watch function was just about the extent of the old training watches.
Not so with the modern sports watch, however, where every conceivable feature known to help in athletic training can be readily engineered into sport watches.
These relatively new (within the last 30 years), affordable, and convenient sport watches have enabled literally millions of athletes to train alone for a place on athletic teams. In years gone by that would not have been possible because, frankly, the average athlete just didn’t have access to a stop watch.
Features of A Sports Watch
Many sports watches are sports specific, that is they are engineered to help the athlete improve and improve both physically and excel performance wise in their chosen sport.
From track and field to triathlons the sports watch is today considered a very necessary personal training aid. For example, if you are a triathlete, take a look at the Timex Ironman sports watch.
This sport watch has specific Ironman ready features that will easily take you from your practice workouts to competition day.
It has 3 different time zones plus daily, weekday, and weekend alarms, which makes completing your workout sessions a breeze. The Ironman sports watch is water resistant and will keep on ticking through swimming laps and even rainfall.
Additionally it has over sized digits on the watch face that are easy to read at a arm’s length and at a glance while practicing any sport including running and swimming laps.
This particular sports watch comes in a 30 a nd 100 lap models, and is sure to be the prized possession of any athlete aspiring to compete in a triathlon.
If you’re running trails, through woods or over obstacle courses, the Timex Expedition Trail sports watch is a terrific and smart choice. The 100 hour chronograph that highlights a lap or split option is a must have feature, and the lap counter can track up to 99 laps.
The 24-hour countdown timer on this Timex sport watch has a countdown/stop and countdown/repeat mode for that helps you measure your various lap performances. Like the Ironman sports watch, it too has three alarms that can be set for day, weekday, weekend, and week and it comes with five minute snoozes.
It has two time zone settings, so you will never have to worry about calculating the time difference. I live in the southwest, and I’m always forgetting whether California is earlier or later than us, so I particularly enjoy the time zone feature on this sports watch model.
The Expedition sports watch has a tough resin case and the durable rubber strap stands up to heavy use during your outdoor workouts and competitions.
From Timex, there is also a Ironman’s womens sports watch for the women triathletes. It’s the Timex Women’s Ironman Triathlon SleeK 50-lap watch, and it features quartz movement, training log to store workout history, 2 interval timers, 3 alarms, and Indiglo night-light, and it is water-resistant to 330 feet (100 M).
Timex Offers A Sports Watch For Everyone
Believe it or not, Timex also has a unisex sports watch. It is the very popular Timex Unisex M Ironman Sleek Digital Resin Strap Watch. This sport looking watch has all the features of the Timex Women’s watch above and it allows for multiple interval timing.
Users love this feature as it lets you alternate intervals; you can run for a certain number of minutes and then walk for a specified number of minutes while sounding an alarm after each interval.
Here’s what Anna Hamel, the traveling biker from Birmingham, Alabama had to say about this terrific little personal training aid,
“From the pool, to the bike, to the run; this sports watch does it all. Even when not racing this watch is a great daily wear and easy to navigate through all the options. Multiple time zones and alarms make it easy as a traveler’s watch and fits small wrists nicely.”
All of these Timex sport watches can be purchased for under $60 and some can be had for as little as $34. Not bad pricing for all of those keen features, is it.
Sports Watch Favorites
The sports watch favorites all come from four leading sports watch manufacturers, Garmin, Timex, Polar and Suunto. We’ve already looked at sports watches from Timex, but we’ll look at sport watches from each of these other leading sports watch manufacturers.
Garmin is king of all the GPS watches. It makes theForerunner GPS watches, which are popular with geocachers, cyclists, triathletes, runners and rowers.
The Garmin Forerunner sport watches come engineered with some extremely useful sports watch features. And, let’s make one thing perfectly clear, Garmin has gone to great lengths to ensure their sports watches readily meet the specific needs of athletes no matter what the sport.
If you don’t require a GPS, the Forerunner 50 is a great entry-level heart rate monitor that also measures speed, distance and cadence with a Foot Pod unit. And, it also supports a bike Speed/Cadence Sensor, which makes it an intelligent choice for triathletes and cyclists.
Of all the Garmin Forerunner models, the Forerunner 305, which does support GPS, is probably the favorite and possibly the best all around sports watch in the Garmin line.
Moving on to the Polar sport watches, while the RS800CX is the undisputed king in terms of including absolutely everything both an athlete and sports scientist could ever wish for, it’s expense probably prohibits the average athlete from owning this sports watch with all the bells and whistles.
However, Polar’s RS400/SD delivers most of what an athlete could want and with 99 exercise files, has plenty of memory storage capacity for the average training athlete.
The RS400/sd sports watch does not support the Polar GPS pod, but does support the S1 foot pod device, which allows the athlete to track speed and distance.
Polar was the first to make a wrist strap on heart rate monitor, and its engineers have continued to build on that early success with its exceptional sports watches of today.
Last, we’ll look at Suunto, a Finish based company that is famous for its Suunto Training Watch. It also is widely recognized for making great heart rate monitors and for its running sports watches, which includes the T3C, T4C, and T6C. Of these, the T3C is the least expensive while the T6C is the most expensive.
Suunto is credited with being the only sports watch manufacturer that supports “Training Effect”, a feature that can tell you if you’re pushing too hard or too little during your workout. This feature basically guides you into the correct zones for optimal performance and training.
The Suunto Training Sport Watches also display real-time heart rate and calories burned, countdown and intervals timers, zone training and stopwatch with splits and laps and session history storage. The display screen is easy to read from an arm’s length away, which enables you to see the display at all times during your workout.
Probably the favorite sports watch from the Suunto people is the T6C as it has 30 logs of session memory capacity compared with only 15 in the T3C and T4.
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