Is there a HR monitor that can do this?

jermas
jermas Posts: 484
I was wondering if there are any HRMs on the market that can calculate time spent in each zone "on the fly".
I'm currently using a forerunner 50, which is fine but, you can only review your workout once uploaded to PC. Surely it would be much more informative to know how long you have been working in say zone 4, whilst out on the bike or, on the turbo. You could then plan a workout to include say, 40mins in zone 4 rather than guess how long. Maybe a bar graph separating each zone, that can be read at a glance?
Just being able to see average heart rate is pretty useless.

Comments

  • bigpikle
    bigpikle Posts: 1,690
    my Timex GPS system does it and you can review it on the watch. Theres actually no upload function on it as its a few years old now, but maybe on the newer Timex systems as well.
    Your Past is Not Your Potential...
  • I use the Polar CS200CAD which does a basic variant of what you're looking for - a simple moving bar which indicates your current HR as measured against the low/high values you have entered on the unit (the polar website will explain in more detail). The product is not too expensive (c£100) and I've found it ideal (although the upload mechanism onto a pc uses a sonic transfer which is not great). I suspect some of the more expensive computers would do something better but if you're looking for a reasonably inexpensive fix this might be it.
  • jermas
    jermas Posts: 484
    Cheers for the replies . I'll have a look at both.
  • dulldave
    dulldave Posts: 949
    My Blackburn Neuro cycle computer does this. You can't download the data though. Just read it off the screen,
    Scottish and British...and a bit French
  • sub55
    sub55 Posts: 1,025
    polar s720i search on ebay 8)
    constantly reavalueating the situation and altering the perceived parameters accordingly
  • I have a Polar rs200 which is more designed for running I think but it's fine for cycling too. You can make up programmes on it where you can specify which zone you want to work in and for how long. For instance, you can set it up to warm up for 10 minutes or so then specify zone 4 for 30 minutes and so on.
  • doyler78
    doyler78 Posts: 1,951
    Polar CS600x does this however it isn't necessarily as useful as you might think. Accumulated time is only useful is some circumstances if it is completed as a block ie doing 40 mins of threshold but if it is made up of 4 minutes here and there throughout a ride of serveral hours then it doesn't really tell you anything useful. Again if you start of doing micro intervals to get the legs warmed up then you can accumulate time in zone that just messes up what you see during your actual intervals. Nice idea but not implemented very well. I don't think there are any that actually show time in interval in zone which is what are you are really asking for.
  • Suunto T3 logs time in zones and you can see these zones on a scale and as a text - but not how long you have been there in total until you've stopped.
  • +1 for the Timex - it records up to 5 zones (plus a below min and above max zone)IIIRC. Most of the others only do 3 when I looked into this about 2 years ago. The only problem with the Timex is that it wasn't particulary well made and fell apart within a couple of years.