On Tuesday I received my Suunto Traverse in the post after being chosen to be 1 of 20 people that are part of the #SuuntoAdventure testing team.
I was delighted to have been chosen. Not only do I love running gadgets but this will also keep me motivated to be on the move for the next couple of months as I start training for Marathon des Sables 2016.
I will be doing most of the testing in December and January right up until I fly all the way to Mongolia for an expedition and ice marathon in -40 so I plan to put it to its most extreme test in those freezing conditions. Lucja, who has also been chosen to be part of the testing team will also be in Mongolia with me so it will be a great chance to compare our Movescoumt records from the trip.
I am no stranger to Suunto as my first and only running watch is the Suunto Ambit 2. I carried this around the Kalahari desert with me last year and personalised the settings for 'Desert Racing' to conserve battery and allow me to view the data I most needed to see. I look forward to being able to compare both Suunto watches.
My first impressions are nothing but positive! It arrived in the post well packaged with the watch half charged, a charger and the instruction manual. I have been given the white which would have been my first choice had I bought the watch myself.
The strap is a lot more flexible and makes it less weighty than the Ambit 2. The buttons have been slightly updated and require less force to navigate your way round.
The battery is blooming amazing. I have 92% left after 24 hours of use which includes a bit of playing around and a quick 5mile run. Further to this is only took 30 minutes to be fully charged (so would take an hour if totally run down). The website says it has 100hours of battery life which is more than enough for my long runs.
The GPS takes a very small 5 seconds to get signal so there is no standing around waiting in the cold making sure no miles are missed.
Generally the watch is very easy to use, despite all of its complex and brilliant features.
I've been wearing the watch not only for my runs but also throughout the day. Some features I use when I'm not running are:
- Seeing how many steps I have walked/run in a day
- Checking when sunrise and sunset are
- Seeing what altitude I am at (though this doesn't change much in London)
- Checking the temperature
There are still some features I haven't yet tested including:
- Navigation
- Linking it with my smartphone to see when I have notifications
- Using the data on the watch to generate an animated GPS map of my running routes
Watch this space as I start testing more of the features and putting it to different tests. This weekend I'll be using it in the 33mile Dorset EnduranceLife ultra. The perfect opportunity for an animated map of my run along the coast!