My Lack Of Interest In the Apple Watch Ultra

My Lack Of Interest In the Apple Watch Ultra

Byrichard

I see people are training for ultrarunning events, scuba diving and more with the Apple Watch Ulta, but I feel no interest in such a watch. The first reason for my lack of interest is that the watch is stupidly expensive for something that lasts just 30 hours on a single charge. I would expect a watch to last at least three or four weeks between charges, and at least a week with daily use. The Ultra does neither.


The second reason for my lack of interest is that Apple watches are fragile. They are not protected from being bashed or knocked when climbing or doing other things. I broke one screen. indoor climbing. With Suunto watches I climbed for years with barely a scratch.


The Third reason is that when you’re diving in cold waters you want a big, clear, easy to read display that is reliable. I trust Suunto to make reliable dive computers, but as a secondary device. My primary device was a Mares Icon HD. This is a large, clear, easy to read dive computer. This is from a few years ago. The point is that for cold water diving I want specialist gear by specialist device makers. It has to be trustworthy.


The fourth reason is that there are perfectly suitable devices for between 100-350 CHF. You don’t need to spend more on a watch than on a fragile device. I want something that tracks my daily walks, hikes, runs and bike rides, without worrying about it breaking. Cheap devices have plenty of functionality. I’d even toy with the idea of getting an Apple watch SE, because cheap watches last as long as expensive watches and some devices are bought for three or four years of use, not a lifetime.


The fifth reason is that a touch screen is often not useful when hiking, diving and more. You need buttons because you can navigate by memory, rather than by looking intently, and because with buttons you don’t need to take your gloves off to use the device.


The Final reason is that Apple watches are designed to make you want to swap them out every second or third year. If you buy the top of the range watch this year then next year or the year after you will want to swap it out, and then again after that. It’s better to buy a watch at a reasonable price, that does what you want, that will least three to four years. The Series four lasted four years. The Suunto Spartan lasted until the strap started to break and the battery started to decline. The Ambit three lasted for many many happy years of use.


If we were not in a pandemic, and if life was normal I’d be focused on doing a variety of sports, and I wouldn’t be so distracted by devices. I’d get the gear I need for the sports I want to do, and I’d do them. My desire to experiment with a variety of devices is due to the pandemic. In better times I would be focused on driving hundreds of kilometres a month, to do things. Not at the moment.


And Finally


I get pleasure from looking at the breadth and diversity of options. If I choose the cheaper options then if I play with them for a year or two, before moving on, then I do not feel wasteful. Three or four years ago I was tempted to get a cycling computer but resisted that urge because I don’t have the use case for it. I do love to cycle but sports watches do the same, and more. They are not dedicated to a single use.


Apple Health Step Data Sources
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Apple Health Step Data Sources

Byrichard

Yesterday I spent some time looking through Apple Health Data Sources. I see that there are plenty of data sources. These are the Apple watch, the iphone, Alltrails, move, connect, stepsapp, pacer, Suunto, Ingress and three more that are marked as inactive.


Move is the app that gets data from some Casio watches. Connect is Garmin connect and gets step data from Garmin devices. If I take steps and they are logged with a casio or a garmin device they do not count in iOS apps but if I take steps with Garmin and Casio devices without also wearing the Apple watch the same steps are not counted.


The Apple Fitness and Health apps have access to all the same data. Everything goes to a central database on the iPhone. It’s from the iphone that the data is not shared transparently between all other apps.


In practice whether you have a suunto, Garmin, Apple Watch or other fitness tracker each device should feed, or retrieve data from Apple health, and each should display that data, regardless of which device you wear.


Whether I wear my Garmin, Suunto or Apple watch I would like all three to access health data transparently so that I can choose which individual watch I want to wear on a specific day. I don’t want to have to wear all three of them. Not that I do. I only have two wrists. 😉 I can only wear two at once.


The privacy argument is moot, because each app can be granted access to Apple Health, and Apple Health can be granted access to each app. This means that all the data is already transiting both ways for all apps.


And Finally


When you buy a Casio or other watch the battery is expected to last from three years to ten years, and you are expected to replace the battery when it dies. With the Apple watch, now that it is four years old, the next step would be to swap the battery. The Apple watch is now at 70 percent. The battery costs 79 CHF to replace.


When the Suunto battery got low on the Ambit 3 I got a Spartan, but when I replaced the Spartan I went for a Garmin, so I lost the ability to keep my old log going, and had to migrate to the Garmin app. With the Apple Watch we’re on yet another silo. Every brand has a silo. With the Apple watch it’s worse, because you have the fitness app, but then you have all the third party apps. Everything would break at once if you stop using the Apple Watch.


I would love for Garmin, Suunto and Apple wath to allow the free flow of tracking data in both directions, so that I could choose the best device to wear, and the best app to fiddle around with. Strava is the giant in the room, but I don’t want to use an app where I have to pay a premium for added functionality.



Rest and Recovery Apps

Rest and Recovery Apps

Byrichard

Either you can buy a collection of casios that each have different functions or you can download apps that have a niche purpose. I have been playing with Gentler Streak and Training day. One looks at heart rate and training. The second looks at resting heart rate and heart rate recovery.


According to the Gentler streak app my fitness “seems stable”. It looks at the routine over the last few months and years, and by this metric decides whether fitness is increasing, stable or declining. With the Gentler Streak app I am fine with my routine.



In contrast the Training Today says that I am overdoing it. I have played with the app for one day so I don”t understand the data yet.



I have been going for two walks per day, and on some days a walk and a swim, or a walk and a run, so it makes sense that the app would say that I am overdoing it at the moment. You can smooth by as many days as you like, from none, to several days. You can also adjust the default intensity.


Both apps give different results so they may be mutually exclusive, at least in my case. They’re interesting because they provide you with an overview of fitness over a period of time. Instead of “time” or “steps” these apps tell you about the health impact of training and whether to push harder, rest, or slow down. It is an alternate way of fitness training, without using Strava or other fitness apps.


Both apps are European. Gentler Streak is Slovenian, funded by the European Union, and Training Today is English. With this quick glance of both apps, I prefer Gentler Streak at this point.


I was inspired by an article about this type of app in the Google app where articles are suggested. This is a niche I had not yet played with.

The March Walking Challenge

The March Walking Challenge

Byrichard

I’m on the Apple Activities March Walking Challenge this month. The app has decided that I must walk or run 298 kilometres. It’s an average of 9.6 kilometres a day. This is both easy and challenging at the same time. Walking 10 kilometres takes about two hours.


When I had a broken arm I walked more than two hours a day, because I had nothing else I could do. I also walked that much because I couldn’t bike, take the car or drive the scooter. As a result, I needed to walk for everything.


My arm isn’t broken anymore. I’m happy to do two hours of exercise a day. I like to devote some of that time to cycling. Cycling 300 kilometres for me would be around 10 bike rides. I would complete the challenge in 12 hours or less.


App Weaknesses


Last month the challenge was to reach 500 Calories per day for 28 days out of 29 and I would have reached that goal if it hadn’t been for making the mistake of uploading a workout from Strava to Garmin. By doing this the app decided that instead of burning 1200 calories according to the Apple Watch activity app I had done just 220. Instead of being angry or frustrated I simply decided to take it easy for the rest of the month (a whole two days left).


The problem with the Apple watch is that you have no way of saying “use this data, not that data. If you make a mistake you have no way of undoing it.


The weather


We just had two days of rain and today is sunny. When it’s raining the appeal of going for a walk is lower. Going for a walk involves dressing for the rain, not being able to see or hear as well as usual. It also involves feeling the cold wind. Luckily when I was facing into the wind for one leg of yesterday’s walk I was on the last stretch, and I was warm from walking.


I wore my hiking boots. The beauty of hiking boots is that they’re waterproof and you can walk through puddles and streams without getting wet. I did walk through streams and puddles. I enjoy it. I had walked through mud. My excuse for walking in the stream of water by the side of the road was that it would clear the mud off of them before I walked back into the apartment.


One of the paradoxes of apartment cleaning is that it’s always done on the day when you’re most likely to walk in the mud and bring some back in. When mud is wet it stays on the shoes. The next day, when you’re running down the stairs, as usual, you dump a nice trail of mud behind.


Routing (pronounced rooting, not grouting).


I considered changing my routes. I would walk through muddy bits at the beginning of my walks and the clean ones, on the way home. This minimises the quantity of mud on my shoes when I get home. The second option is to wear the hiking shoes I keep in the car, on muddy days. Bringing mud into the garage doesn’t matter.


Methods


  • Ten kilometres a day – two hours of walking
  • Ingress – either by completing missions or by participating in an event
  • Peak days – walk 20 kilometers on some days
  • Running – running the same distance takes less time, but impacts the knees


Walking ten kilometres a day can be achieved either by simply spending as little time sitting as possible. We easily walk ten kilometres a day during a conference. We’re even likely to walk the equivalent of twenty kilometers


Ingress Missions and days are a good way to stand, and walk for hours at a time. In both cases, you’re covering reasonable distances.


Peak days are those where you walk twenty to thirty kilometers on one day, and bank the distance, so that on other days you can devote time to other tasks, such as writing blog posts.


Running is a good way of covering bigger distances in the same amount of time. It requires the right surface and shoes.


The futile Challenge


At the end of the day, the challenge is futile. If I cycle thirty plus kilometers I’m challenging myself to climb up hills, I’m challenging myself to sprint as fast as cars through villages, and sometimes I keep up on 50 kilometer per hour sections. If the weather is good cycling makes more sense.


I should achieve the challenge quickly, and get back to cycling.

Iredpoint by Frogg GMBH
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Iredpoint by Frogg GMBH

Byrichard

The Apple watch and other devices have integrated barometers that allow them to track changes in altitude. Iredpoint by Frogg GMBH is one app that takes advantage of this. It allows you to tell the app what type of climbing you are doing as well as the difficulty.


Types of Climbing


This app allows you to choose the type of climbing that you are doing. You can choose between bouldering, top rope climbing, sport climbing, trad climbing, multirope climbing, free solo, aid climbing and last, and most awesome of all, Via Ferrata. I’m pleasantly surprised by that last one. In summer this is one of my favourite pass times.


You can let the app know what type of climbing you are doing.


Climbing Grade


Right before you start ascending a route you can tell the app of the gradient that you are about to climb and this includes American, European and other gradients. For Via ferrata for example you can choose between the French PD, AD, ED and other ratings of the German number system


I am still learning how to use this app


When I tried this app at Vitam Park I made sure to state the gradient and then started to climb. You see that the height information is correct. For the second climb I did the same. For consequent climbs I did not select a difficulty gradient or took breaks on the route and you can see that the graph does not include the full climb. For future versions of this app I would like it to take the starting altitude as a base and combine climbs until the correct height is reached.


I started by climbing one top rope but subsequent climbs were bottom roped and I would like the ability, while tracking to switch between the two, as well as when I have finished climbing for the day.


Heart rate was not tracked.


This is an app with great potential and I see myself using it from now on. What I love about this app is that it tracks data while you are climbing rather than just the climb and the grade. I like that it offers such a diversity of climbing options. I will use it when I do via ferrata. I look forward to Spring and Summer when I can use it outdoors.

100 Move Day Goals reached

100 Move Day Goals reached

Byrichard

I have 100 move day goals reached. The difficulty of this goal depends on how high you set the bar. If you set the bar at two hundred calories a day then the goal is easy to achieve. If you set the goal at 500 or 600 calories then the achievement is slightly more interesting. 


An easy goal to reach, one days with the move goal achieved.


I would have reached it sooner if the screen on the apple watch had not broken and if I had not had a few sub-goal days over the last three or more months. I set the goal high enough that I would need to walk for more than two hours a day to reach it. On the bike I reach it within 40 to 50 minutes. 


I still haven’t had a perfect month. To have a perfect month I would have had to burn 550 calories every day for a month. I’d tease myself by saying that I set the goal to high but I reach it almost every day. It’s fun to set it high enough for it to be a challenge. It would be cheating if I set it lower. 


Despite its simplicity these goals and medals are having a positive impact on my fitness habits. Sometimes I reach the goal by sitting very little. On days when I go for long hikes or cycle I double or triple the move goal so I exceed the requirements of this badge. 


On other days I burn less than 200 calories over the day and I rely on the evening Zwift session to get myself over the daily goal. This habit is great. Earlier this week the CDC issued a statement that people should do any form of exercise for two and a half hours a day. They even removed the requirement for it to be in ten minute or more sessions. I exceeded this requirement by five and a half hours a week over the last four weeks. 


Monthly challenge


In August the monthly challenge was to double the move goal eight times. In Octobre the challenge was to do 27 workouts in a month. In November the challenge is to move 189 kilometres. If I put the road tyre back on the rear wheel of my bike then this is an easy challenge to reach. My bike rides range between 20-50km a ride. If virtual bike rides count then I would have achieved this goal days ago. As things are we’re half way through the month and I have just 80km. 

Planned Obscolesence as Fragility

Planned Obscolesence as Fragility

Byrichard

I want to discuss Planned obsolescence as fragility. In the days of Nokia you could buy a phone and give it to a teenage boy and expect it to survive without breaking. I know because I was a teenage boy with a Nokia phone. So were plenty of my peers. It was more likely that someone would lose or drown their phone than break it. I only broke one phone display in those days and that took some effort. 


Ingress


A few years ago I was playing Ingress and I managed to shatter three screens in quick succession and it was frustrating but it was due to me walking while playing ingress. I replaced the screens three times before I bought a rugged crosscall phone that was designed to withstand falls, submersion and more. I didn’t use it for long because I had connectivity issues. These were android devices. 


Lifeproof, Otterbox and Quad lock


When the risk of breaking phones increased so did the need for protective cases. I have used lifeproof cases for iphones, otterbox for iphones and a blackberry device and quad lock for the most recent iphone. I use these cases because dropping a phone just once will shatter either the front panel or the back panel. It’s for this reason that I used an iphone SE for more than a year. You can break the screen but you can’t break the back. 


I thought another iphone wouldn’t fit with the protective case within the clasps of the DJI drone remote control so I took it out of it’s protective case. Within 30 seconds the phone fell to the floor and the rear glass shattered. I promptly put the phone back into its case. 


On the one hand brands like Apple say “Look at our beautiful device devices, they’re so sleek and elegant” and then you shatter one of the screens within days of getting it and you think “What is the point of elegance if it shatters?”


The unfinished device


The Unfinished device I am thinking of is the Apple Watch. As I mentioned in an earlier post I have had at least half a dozen fitness watches and two diving watches. My Suunto Ambit 3 came with me for three years of sporting activites without showing any real signs of wear and tear. The straps are fine, the screen is fine. The only signs of wear are on the bezel that protects the screen and this is key. 


Most luxury watches use sapphire glass and despite the rugged qualities of this glass they protect them with a protective bezel. If you’re climbing and hit the watch against rocks, metal rungs, door frames or other surfaces the bezel keeps the glass safe. 


I know for a fact that my suunto Ambit 3 took rock impacts straight to the screen as I climbed but the glass is concave, sloping inwards from the centre to the bezel. If it suffers an impact it is designed to survive. 


The Apple watch has an unprotected glass screen that is flat. It is unsuitable for climbing because when you’re climbing your wrists hit rock, metal, resin hand moulds and ropes or cables. Whereas Suunto watches are designed for rugged sports Apple watches are designed for park runs and boardrooms. You find articles like this one about how to protect your apple watch when doing sports. To me the notion that you would need to protect a sports tracking watch is absurd. The whole reason for a sports tracking watch is to be light and tough, to survive indoor climbing. 


In indoor climbing the materials you come across are wood, metal and resin hand holds. They’re not granite, limestone and other forms of rock. They’re soft and forgiving. 


I have a theory that the hairline fractures that appeared on my screen after a fourth session of climbing with this watch were caused either by A) the rope somehow whipping the screen and fracturing it or B) When going from one hold to another I applied pressure to the screen at just the right angle for it to shatter in two places, splitting the touchscreen in three. 


The display itself is fine. The only reason I noticed the damage is that the touch screen failed to respond. 


Take it off


The most absurd suggestion to not damaging a sport apple watch is to take it off when you’re exercising. If you buy a sports version of the apple watch is taking it off a viable solution? If that’s the solution then buy a suunto or a garmin. They cost the same, have good battery life and they will survive any sport you can survive. Just google search broken suunto screen. A search for broken Garmin screen will yield broken screens. 


The protective sleeve


If a solution to protecting a device is a protective sleeve then it is an unfinished device. Your biggest fear with a watch should be that the screen gets scratched as you use it over the years. It shouldn’t be that you shatter it while climbing indoors. 


Conclusion – Buy a case


If you buy an iPhone you should automatically get a case. With Apple’s current design philosophy you should not buy an Apple watch until you can buy a protective case for it. The new design philosophy for mobile phones, watches, and as of yesterday laptops is to push the boundaries of survivability to their limits. I hope that the trend to make things more fragile goes away. 

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The Apple Watch does not fill a niche

Byrichard

The Apple Watch rather than fill a niche provides a fifth screen. According to Wikipedia the four first screens are the cinema screen, the television screen and the mobile phone and tablet screen. The fifth screen is the smart watch as designed by Apple, Samsung, Sony and others. Apple and others have designed phones that bring the mobile phone experience to the wrist.

Energy efficient

Suunto, Garmin, Fitbit and other brands fill the wrist worn niche effectively because they have designed devices with energy efficient displays that provide tracking whilst at the same time giving extended battery life.

Extended battery life in use

Health trackers by fitbit and other companies have been designed to last for a week or more whilst tracking movement 24 hours a day. Suunto, Garmin and other brands have designed watches that can track activities for hours or even days before they need charging.

Long stand by time

When not in use all of the devices mentioned above can last for weeks. In the case of the Suunto Ambit two I have found that it loses one percentage of charge per day. As a result of this it can be used as a watch for three months before I need to think of charging.

Data analysis

All of these tools are for collecting data about the route you took, the intensity of the exercise tracked, heart rate and complementary information. When synced on the computer or website a lot of information is presented. Garmin syncs with Runkeeper, Strava, Garmin connect and other services, Suunto syncs with Movescount and Strava intuitively. Fitbit syncs with the fitbit site and other fitness apps. The most interesting data is analysed on a computer rather than the wrist unit. This leaves the device to track information cost effectively, where cost is battery life, and effective is defined by how long you can track an activity.

Conclusion:

My passion for “smart watches” stems from scuba diving. I bought a Suunto D9 to track dives and loved taking dive data and analysing it in view of improving my diving ability. I tracked training at the gym, hiking and other activities with various phones and their weakness was battery life. When you go for a hike in the mountains, go for a via ferrata or do a number of other sporting activities for extended periods of time you want a device that can last as long as you do.

Suunto’s Ambit 2 filled that need very well, so well that I upgraded to the Suunto Ambit 3. As an android user I can’t  take advantage of all the features yet but that will come soon, this month in fact.

The Apple Watch does not fill any of the requirements I have listed above and for this reason I am not tempted. I see it as a fifth screen that does not fill a niche. Fitness trackers, fitness watches and other devices cost the same price or less and fill niche requirements effectively. Why would I want a gimmick?