Advice on what heart rate monitor to buy..

rokkala

Hey, so ive just started cycling again the last couple of months after doing nothing over the winter, and as part of improving/maintaining my performance and fitness on the bike i was looking at getting a heart rate monitor.

Trouble is, i am really not looking to spend anything over £150, and found it very hard to get multiple reviews on cycling specific heart rate monitors in that price-range. And if i do find more than one then it has always seemed very conflicting opinions.

So my question to you people-in-the-know. What would be best monitor for me to buy if i'm looking for things like real-time heart rate reporting, average heart-rate, speed, average speed, and preferably the ability to see cadence and upload ride info into computer program to keep track of everything. Might have missed out something that would be important but im sure you can let me know if i have!

Any help be much appreciated =]

cougie

I'd go for a more basic model - one that gives you the HR you are at now, the Average HR and alarms if you go out of your range.

Anything else is just bells and whistles really - unless you're really a stats kind of guy. Just having this data is no use unless you know what to do with it, and you train consistently.

rokkala

yea true that, although i'd still prefer it to do speed and average speed as well so i can just have the monitor on my bike and not need a speedo as well.

What would you recommend anyway?

jaredpace

I use the Polar CS200 with cadence sensor. Gives you heart rate, tells you how long in the self setting target zones. Real time speed and average speed, mileage, real time cadence and average cadence. Can be set up for two bikes. My two are set for the turbo trainer and winter hack, the other for my race road bike and xc mountain bike. All info uploadable to the Polar training website, where you can analyze the data. All in all, a great piece of kit for about £100. The only thing you cannot do, is upload routes to it. It is purely to give you info, not accept it back. If mine went wrong, I'd buy another one! Hope that helps.

rokkala

thanks for the reply jared, think i'll go for that then.

Courage Monsieur

the CS200 cad does look really good for the price. may get one meself!

Mister W

Try a Garmin Forerunner 50 with a GSC-10 speed/cadence sensor. It will monitor and record your HR, speed and cadence then allow you to upload the data to your PC.

eh

I'd probably go for a basic Polar and a fairly basic standard cycling computer (without cadence, as it is a waste of time IMO and makes your bike look a mess).

When you think about it most of the data is obvious anyway.

IMHO unless you can afford a power meter I think some kind of stopwatch is about the best bit of kit you can have.

Spender1330

I have the Garmin Forerunner 50 and it is an awesome bit of kit. Saw one recently somewhere with the cadence monitor and footpod (for those days off the bike) all for under a hundred quid and the computer upload system is pretty impressive.

A good entry level bit of kit - especially if you do any running. it is neat enough to wear as an everyday watch and I changed the battery myself recently thanks to a handy online guide I found - easy, and it uses relatively cheap batteries too.

Good luck with whatever you choose.

zedders

jaredpace wrote:

I use the Polar CS200 with cadence sensor. Gives you heart rate, tells you how long in the self setting target zones. Real time speed and average speed, mileage, real time cadence and average cadence. Can be set up for two bikes. My two are set for the turbo trainer and winter hack, the other for my race road bike and xc mountain bike. All info uploadable to the Polar training website, where you can analyze the data. All in all, a great piece of kit for about £100. The only thing you cannot do, is upload routes to it. It is purely to give you info, not accept it back. If mine went wrong, I'd buy another one! Hope that helps.

Am thinking of getting this computer/HRM. Can anyone tell me if jaredpace is saying it can be set up for two bikes, what does he mean? I'm guessing he's on about getting another cadence senor, another speed senor and another computer mount? Off PBK that's another £50 or so!
Anyone else using the CS200?

rokkala

zedders wrote:

jaredpace wrote:

I use the Polar CS200 with cadence sensor. Gives you heart rate, tells you how long in the self setting target zones. Real time speed and average speed, mileage, real time cadence and average cadence. Can be set up for two bikes. My two are set for the turbo trainer and winter hack, the other for my race road bike and xc mountain bike. All info uploadable to the Polar training website, where you can analyze the data. All in all, a great piece of kit for about £100. The only thing you cannot do, is upload routes to it. It is purely to give you info, not accept it back. If mine went wrong, I'd buy another one! Hope that helps.

Am thinking of getting this computer/HRM. Can anyone tell me if jaredpace is saying it can be set up for two bikes, what does he mean? I'm guessing he's on about getting another cadence senor, another speed senor and another computer mount? Off PBK that's another £50 or so!
Anyone else using the CS200?

Hey zedders, i ended up getting the CS200cad. I think he means that on the HR monitor settings you can have a 'Bike Set #1' & 'Bike Set #2'. Basically it just means that instead of manually changing autostart preference, cadence on/off & wheel circumference you select bike 1 or 2.

But yea, when i got new bike you either need to swap the mount and sensors over or you buy the speed sensor, cadence sensor and mount again. Should be able to get it all for just under £50 at dolphin fitness if you want to do that.

I just bought some cable ties and swapped it over from old bike.