IT WORKED!!!

When I first put it on today it immediately registered consistently, instead of turning on and off like yesterday, and the numbers made sense, unlike yesterday before I put gel on. So I decided to take the gel with me and see how things went first without it. After 10 min of easy riding with HR working fine, I was in the same spot as yesterday when I was about to ride harder. I looked down and HR was not registering AGAIN. Ugh! I looked up and saw power lines and thought, "Hmmm, maybe Kiwi Stoker is right. Maybe the power lines affect it." So, I rode to a place that was away from the power lines and on the way there it registered intermittently and the numbers it showed were too low.

However, when I got to the road I wanted to push harder on, I pulled over and put on the electrode gel, a good amount, and my HR immediately registered and seemed accurate. When I started riding harder, it started going up, but seemed to stop at 115 even though I started pushing at an interval effort to get the thing to go up. Well, finally it seemed to be registering properly and I realized I needed to be patient with it. It shows my HR from like 30 seconds before and when I took off faster, it took a while to catch up. Once I stayed at a moderate pace for a while it began to stay at a consistent HR that made sense to me.

Eventually I turned back around and went back the same way I came to see if it would act up around the power lines. It did not. I'm not entirely sure what was different about today than yesterday, other than I started with a very small amount of gel initially yesterday ... and after I added more, maybe I wasn't patient enough at a higher effort to see the proper HR. I thought I was, but maybe not. I was afraid to go too hard for too long, per my instructions not to ride hard.

So, I don't know what will happen the NEXT time I use it, but hopefully I've got it all figured out now. YAY!!!!!!!!!!!

BTW, Dh did some research and found that bra with the built in strap. I was planning on ordering it today if my HR didn't work, but since it did, I'll see if it continues to work. If I start having trouble again, I'll probably try that next. Thanks for all your comments. I'll let you know if it works again tomorrow. It was FUN going for what felt like a respectable paced ride. Faster than I've been riding lately, but I didn't feel like I was over doing it. Averaged 15.1 during the section I stayed at 135-140. Well, it was a bit over that a lot. It was actually hard to keep it below 140, especially when it's not showing me what my HR is right NOW. I have to learn to work with it better. And MAN what a difference even a small grade makes. I went like 12 mph up a 1-2% grade and 19-20 mph down that same grade coming back! All at about the same HR. This is all new and exciting for me to actually know my HR and see what it does on different grades. Woo hoo!!!