New Garmin Swim Watch

[Talvi]

Anyone any experience of this:- Suunto Ambit ? Cheaper than the Garmin ...

[CoachDavidShen]

Well, my first FINIS Swimsense's band had its holes start ripping apart. Now my second FINIS Swimsense weirdly reset itself in the middle of the workout. My first was over a year old and out of warranty. The second is a bit less than a year.

Thankfully I got an Amazon email saying my new Garmin Swim watch has shipped. I'm hoping that it will last longer than my Swimsenses....

[CoachDavidShen]

This morning I swam with my new Garmin Swim watch.

Pretty decent overall. I customized a screen, but unfortunately didn't use the Rest timer function so had to depend on looking up at the wall clock more.

Also got spoiled with the Swimsense's auto lap/stop function. Had to retrain myself to hit the pause button after each interval.

Still no issues, worked great in the pool.

One issue I'm working out is the syncing with the ANT stick. I have my Garmin 910XT synced to my mac, but it is not recognizing my Swim watch. checking on that now.

[mt6127]

Originally Posted by CoachDavidShen

being a gadget freak, i of course had to pre-order one ;-). will post here on how it well it works. given that the band on my swimsense is deteriorating due to pool water exposure, i am anxious to give this one a try. i would swim with my Garmin 910Xt but it's a bit bulky and looks like this one is better for pool swimming....whereas the 910XT is probably better for OW swimming because its GPS.

Speaking of gadgets, a tech savvy friend who's new to TI and I were talking about developing a "virtual coach" tool. Imagine an underwater web cam married up to a notebook or smart phone app, that would allow you to video conference to a coach for real time viewing and discussion. At a $200 price point - hit or miss? assumes you have Wi-Fi or wireless internet on your notebook or phone..

[CoachDavidShen]

Originally Posted by mt6127

Speaking of gadgets, a tech savvy friend who's new to TI and I were talking about developing a "virtual coach" tool. Imagine an underwater web cam married up to a notebook or smart phone app, that would allow you to video conference to a coach for real time viewing and discussion. At a $200 price point - hit or miss? assumes you have Wi-Fi or wireless internet on your notebook or phone..

i think the danger of putting an expensive laptop or smartphone near pool water would make this a tough sell, plus the problem of persistent and consistent internet to make a web conference continuous for the length of a coaching session could make this problematic. i have problems keeping a skype video call going for that long...perhaps you could try this over skype first and see if it would work?

[CoachDavidShen]

Originally Posted by CoachDavidShen

This morning I swam with my new Garmin Swim watch.

Pretty decent overall. I customized a screen, but unfortunately didn't use the Rest timer function so had to depend on looking up at the wall clock more.

Also got spoiled with the Swimsense's auto lap/stop function. Had to retrain myself to hit the pause button after each interval.

Still no issues, worked great in the pool.

One issue I'm working out is the syncing with the ANT stick. I have my Garmin 910XT synced to my mac, but it is not recognizing my Swim watch. checking on that now.

OK got the ANT stick syncing issue resolved. The Garmin Connect website's display of your intervals is pretty good. It also seems to be detecting the type of stroke pretty well too as I'm now working on the other 3.

I also started using the Rest interval mode on the watch which is nice because now I don't have to look up at the wall clock but can just look at my wrist to check rest times. this can be used for constant rest intervals as well as traditional swim intervals where you have a time interval for both the swim portion and the rest.

All in all, the Garmin Swim watch is pretty slick. I'm using it now instead of my Swimsense.

Now if only someone would allow me to store HR for the duration of a swim workout - a melding of FINIS ear clip HR monitor and storing it, and syncing it later with the web?

[Talvi]

Originally Posted by CoachDavidShen

Now if only someone would allow me to store HR for the duration of a swim workout - a melding of FINIS ear clip HR monitor and storing it, and syncing it later with the web?

That clip sounds great, thanks.

I get that the watches are designed to drive traffic to websites etc but what's the pull of the website over pc's for users in all this?

p.s. I gave up on the Ambit - it has no alarms linked to functions eg HR so you have to keep checking! Not much better than sticking your finger on your wrist and counting imho!

[truth1ness]

Originally Posted by CoachDavidShen

OK got the ANT stick syncing issue resolved. The Garmin Connect website's display of your intervals is pretty good. It also seems to be detecting the type of stroke pretty well too as I'm now working on the other 3.

I also started using the Rest interval mode on the watch which is nice because now I don't have to look up at the wall clock but can just look at my wrist to check rest times. this can be used for constant rest intervals as well as traditional swim intervals where you have a time interval for both the swim portion and the rest.

All in all, the Garmin Swim watch is pretty slick. I'm using it now instead of my Swimsense.

Now if only someone would allow me to store HR for the duration of a swim workout - a melding of FINIS ear clip HR monitor and storing it, and syncing it later with the web?

Thanks for the review David. Would like to hear more about the pros and cons of each and any more thoughts since your last update.

If I'm understanding correctly, it sounds like the Swimsense advantage is the autolap feature so you don't have to press the button each lap (I'm surprised they didn't match this feature). Do you find having the press the button a big annoyance, or does it actually give you more accurate readings? It sounds like main advantage of the Garmin is the rest feature, which I'm assuming is a separate button you press to take breaks (or do TI drills), whereas taking breaks with the Swimsense messes up all your data? Are these two features the basic differentiators in picking one over the other?

[CoachDavidShen]

Originally Posted by truth1ness

Thanks for the review David. Would like to hear more about the pros and cons of each and any more thoughts since your last update.

If I'm understanding correctly, it sounds like the Swimsense advantage is the autolap feature so you don't have to press the button each lap (I'm surprised they didn't match this feature). Do you find having the press the button a big annoyance, or does it actually give you more accurate readings? It sounds like main advantage of the Garmin is the rest feature, which I'm assuming is a separate button you press to take breaks (or do TI drills), whereas taking breaks with the Swimsense messes up all your data? Are these two features the basic differentiators in picking one over the other?

Well right now it seems that the FINIS Swimsense site is up and down a bit (now up). That was annoying and was a reason to switch to the Garmin when I could not login for weeks.

Pushing the button is more accurate. I found the Swimsense autolap feature to be inaccurate - well it made me feel better because it told me I was swimming faster - but the more realistic times were always from hitting the lap button manually.

You can enter drill lengths/laps manually later into the Garmin. I haven't tried this yet.

One thing I noticed was that it was not recognizing my butterfly correctly. Well, I guess maybe my butterfly isn't all that great, but it would be nice to know that the watch knows I'm sorta doing the butterfly sometime...

Personally I think the Garmin is better - I did like the Swimsense but the problems with that product led me to the Garmin.

[ktchua]

Hi CoachDavidShen, I'd like to hear your thoughts on 910xt vs Garmin Swim on swim features and usability.

a) I know Swim has drill function and I wonder if it's more helpful for TI purposes.

b) Since I do not yet have a HRM or bike monitor, I'm guessing 910xt can serve my non-swimming workout. But its bulkier and only 20hr recharable life (unlike Garmin Swim that can last a year and can use it as regular watch).

c) 910XT's vibration alerts and I wonder if we can use it for better TI training. I was hoping it can function like a tempo trainer but looks like the alerts are only for distance and time and not for stroke counts or stroke timing.

Kien