Heart Rate Monitors

[Bike Chick]

I'm wanting to buy a new bike computer with a hrm and would like to be able to use the same hrm/timer for my swim and my run. I am having difficulty finding one that will work for all three and will fit on a woman's wrist. Any suggestions?

[Veronica]

I use a Polar. It's a little bulky on the wrist, but I've gotten use to it.

V.

[Suzi-Sue]

Just use a Polar RS200 (think it's great btw :D)
(waterproof too, although, never tried it in the pool)
Logs a lot of info, cost me £75.

Tells you everything under the sun.
*Max HR - bpm & %
*Avg HR - bpm & %
*How long i was in the HR zones for (you can customize your own zones and have different ones saved depending on what sort of ride you are doing)
*Stopwatch view (also has an easy lap function, so you could hit it when you get out of the pool, and that would be for example, your LAP 1. Bike would then be LAP 2, then hit it before the run, and that's your LAP 3.)
The computer will summarize all this for you, but also give you a total time at the end.
*Calorie view
*Zone view

It stores about 2weeks of info on it. You can also upload to polar's online training coach via PC (haven't tried this yet I use Mac, but looks to be a good feature anyway)

Also has training 'zone locks' - when you reach your target training zone for the ride, just hold a button and it will know how you are training. (an alarm can also be set for when you drop below or go above the zone, such as on those lovely hills :cool:)

Oh, and as for wrist size, the RS200 is on the 3rd notch (out of 14), pulled v.tight. I normally wear it on the 4th. And my wrist are tiny, about a 14-15cm circumference.
The body of the watch is quite bulky, but it's needs to be due to all the info you see on the screen at once.

Hope this helps! I remember spending weeks looking for the perfect monitor;)

[Trigress]

I've been looking for alternatives to the Polar for the very same reason - it fits better around my ankle than around my wrist... I've tried a few other HRMs though, a Sigma and a Oregon, and they both seem to behave strangely somehow. The first one simply died on me, I kept having no pulse (!), and yes I did change the batteries, the other one has the least usefriendly interface one can imagine, and regularly a) refuses to provide HR monitoring at all, b) refuses to start the timer (!) and c) dreams up its own pulse values ( I don't think 264 BPM is realistic, especially not when I'm not even breathing heavily). So I've resigned, and am currently saving enough money to buy a Polar. They cost a fortune though, and as I say, they fit my ankle far better than my wrist, but at least it can be mounted on the handlebar. Let's hope it won't make the bike lop-sided... :rolleyes:

[OakLeaf]

My Garmin Forerunner 301 fits fine on my wrist. I've got pretty small wrists and the velcro strap would fit someone as much as an inch smaller. They're still available from Amazon. I love it except for the fact that it doesn't accommodate a cadence sensor.

The current model is the Forerunner 305, which has a better antenna than the 301 and also displays cadence. It comes with a plastic strap, but Garmin has an optional velcro strap (https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?pID=1335#) available for the 305.

ETA: since we're measuring our wrists... 14.5 cm (5.75"), and as I said, there's a couple of cm to spare on the strap for my 301. It's water resistant to the IPX7 standard, but it might be a little bulky to swim with on your wrist. I remember reading something on Garmin's website about people putting their Forerunners under their swim caps (which would also be easier with the velcro strap than the plastic one).

[spindizzy]

I have a Polar. Bit of a learning curve initially and it is bulky, but it gives me the data I need for run and bike. I am hoping to get some sort of power meter for bike and it will acoomodate that as well.