Running Watch help

[russy01]

Evening Chaps,

My partner runs a lot and is starting to get fed up of taking her Ipod touch on every run so she can use her "Nike+" app. I have told her to consider using a watch, I see that Nike, Garmin, Polar etc all have similar offerings.

I currently use a Garmin Edge 510 on my bike so I instantly suggested a Garmin product as I love mine. She is however a bit hooked with Nike+ and doesnt really want to start using a different system.

Anybody with any experience and recommendations?

Cheers.

[Fozziebear]

No experience of Nike, ran with someone using a garmin and found it steered us in the right direction, wasn't keen on the bleeping every mile. I've used Suunto a lot, got an X9i and a vector, both have fantastic battery life but timer only goes to 25hrs I think, not that it's a massive problem I use starve on the iPhone, poor battery life only issue

[Cybertronian]

I'm a former owner of the Nike+ GPS watch and enjoyed using it, but it was so unreliable. I was once on my way to a 10k race and it refused to switch on and the only way to kick-start it was to plug it into a USB port or to charge it. Thankfully, my car has a powered USB port and it restarted and linked up to satellites immediately. My replacement unit died after the screen fogged up and Nike sent me a replacement despite it being out of warranty; I decided enough was enough and flipped it on to eBay and bought a Garmin instead.

If your other half is keen on remaining in the Nike ecosystem, they can use this converter which will take your Garmin runs and upload them to the Nike website if they want to maintain their scores etc.

[944fan]

I have a Garmin Forerunner 301 which is really old now. I think I have had it for about 7 years and I bought it second hand.

Anyway its great. Has a bike mode also and you can get a quick release mount for the bike and your wrist for Triathlons. You can get them 2nd hand on the Fleabay for about £80.

Most tend to offer pretty much that same stuff. What I like about the Garmin kit is the Garmin Connect website is pretty good for reviewing your runs etc. Although there are plenty of decent 3rd party sites (Strava etc)

[Craigyp79]

http://www.dcrainmaker.com/

Great website with in-depth reviews of all major GPS watches.

[russy01]

Thanks for your help. I'm going to have a good look at the varmints products, not keen on how Nike are so uptight with data exporting etc.

[mondeoman]

I use a Garmin 405 with an HRM, does everything I need, and then some! Some good prices on ebay too.