Anyone use a tracker for swimming?

nuffer

Swimming is my main cardio activity and I've made enough progress that I often lose count of my laps. There's an app for the Pebble watch through Swim.com that looks intriguing. I'm curious if anyone here uses it.

Currently I have a Garmin Vivofit and while it's waterproof, it is no help tracking much of anything in the pool.

Thanks for any tips.

brianpperkins

The Vivoactive tracks laps. The 910XT is hitting clearance at some stores now ($259 at REI a couple weeks ago) and does structured workouts and can track open water swim in addition to lap counting. I used a Tomtom multisport and it does have a swim mode for lap counting but it can be finicky to say the least.

justfenix

IThe way I keep track of laps and keep motivated is that I start with a 10 lap set then add 2 laps every set. Since my goal is 200 I know that once I hit my 28 lap set I have 10 more to go. Unfortunately cramping has been as issue so I don't always get there but I can still do the math to figure out my total laps at the point where I had to stop.

I then use this calculator (http://caloriesburnedhq.com/calories-burned-swimming) to figure out my calories burned and log them here. I like this calculator a ot more than the one on here because it uses more variables to give you a more accurate number of calories burned.

glevinso

I use a 920xt that counts laps. The 910xt also does that, as well as the much cheaper Garmin Swim.

"Real" swimmers sneer at these things but as a triathlete I find the data invaluable

earlnabby

justfenix wrote: »

IThe way I keep track of laps and keep motivated is that I start with a 10 lap set then add 2 laps every set. Since my goal is 200 I know that once I hit my 28 lap set I have 10 more to go. Unfortunately cramping has been as issue so I don't always get there but I can still do the math to figure out my total laps at the point where I had to stop.

I then use this calculator (http://caloriesburnedhq.com/calories-burned-swimming) to figure out my calories burned and log them here. I like this calculator a lot more than the one on here because it uses more variables to give you a more accurate number of calories burned.

I have a lap counter I wear on my finger plus the clock and used the same calculator. I then found an entry in the MPF database that gave me a similar number of calories. I log it in MFP using the entry for "Swimming, leisurely, general". This gives me 567 calories per hour and the "calories burned" calculator gives me 563 for a hour doing the breaststroke so they are close enough for my purposes (I only eat back about 25% of my swimming calories anyway).

I have a Fitbit Flex which doesn't give me any useful data for swimming.

HillOE

I am rolling my eyes (humor) at the "real" comment. If you are trying at any sport than you are a "real" whatever that may be.

I've been swimming on and off competitively for 35+ years and still lose track of laps. I have the 910 and the 310 (both xt). The 910 will be accurate to a couple of meters (on preset settings, but you can get accurate to your stroke per lap if you wanted to) and you can wear it on your wrist. The 310, less accurate, I wear my 310 off the band and under my cap - then it's pretty accurate. That's helpful for long course open water. In a pool, either will work because if you end up doing some random yardage/m that can't be broken down to an easy length you know that's the error factored in. If you got $150+ to shell out for a Garmin and feel it's a good investment, go for it.

They have little counters you wear on your index finger (swimoutlet.com probably has them) and press with your thumb that will count laps and probably some time, it's super basic and maybe $20. That works well when you're just starting out, easy.

For me, and I'm a decent swimmer so lots of data isn't super important for swimming in factoring it into my multi sport training, for 90% of my swims I use a IM Timex ($25 at Target...but their line of sport watch should work too), and just hit the lap counter for my timed sets. It's great in that you can see how your laps stack up over the workout (I think they go up to 99 lap counts). For endurance, consistency is key, so I want my 1st hundred to be the same as my 10th hundred (I don't need to keep a log, so I'll clear it at end of practice). So say I swim 100 in 2:00, that's easy enough for me to remember time and time again, but in 4-8 weeks I want that 2:00 time to either be a whole lot easier to get to or be at a consistently quicker time and then I adjust my workout to that new time.

I also go into the pool with a workout so I know what my yardage/m workout will be. I do everything on my list I've done that distance. Doing the same workout over and over gets boring and I find the corners..I mean laps...are cut or not counted. I do stuff like ladders (100/200/300/200/100), drills (stroke technique - there are a ton on line to follow and watch), speed work - say 100 in x time and whatever time remains is your rest, then you do that so many times. All this will build a better/more confident/easier swim. Also, if you can swim more than one stroke include that into your routine, so I usually through in a few laps of backstroke to even out my swim, it's not much probably doesn't do anything, but if I do 3000 free, and then toss in 100 of back, hell yeah I feel that in my arms.

If you're looking for cals burned, yeah a Garmin or similar would be a good bet, I'm OK with general area of burned cals....

soldiergrl_101

I love the Tom Tom watch, swimming is my main cardio...there watch not only does heart rate, it counts laps, distance, stroke, time per lap, calories and you can use it for running and biking also!

glevinso

I only say that because many competitive swimmers think wearing any sort of watch in the pool to be offensive, let alone of the fancy swim watches that helps you count laps and time and such

My coach likes to see the data since he isn't on deck with me watching me swim. It gives him a ton of directly measured feedback on my workouts that is more than just a comment saying "this workout felt great/sucked/etc"

brianpperkins

My TomTom would miscount laps when I swam. Loved it for running. It's a good basic cycling GPS but the lack of power, routes, and segments led to its replacement with a Garmin 510 on my bike.

nuffer

Hah, I had no idea that "serious" swimmers sneer at watches.

Both my kids swim competitively and cannot understand why I'm struggling to keep track of laps. But they constantly have coaches telling them what to do during their practices. I don't have that .

It sounds like the Garmin products have an edge on competing products, at least as far as user satisfaction.

Nobody here has a Pebble, it sounds like? I'm intrigued by that technology and going just on price it beats the Garmin by quite a lot.

andreabeitler1

I love my pebble and it tracks very well

csman49

My instinct to survive in the water makes it hard for me to track lengths. So i use my 910xt. Sometimes is miscounts, mostly if i pause mid length then set off again, it will sometimes track that as 2 lengths. But i know that a length (30m) for me is 1min at best, so if there are 2 consecutive laps that add up to around that time, i know that it should be just 1. Data-wise, I can merge them after.

nuffer

I am now using a Pebble. Have had it for a couple of weeks. It's the classic/older version purchased directly from Swim.com.

It seems to track well while in the pool. Very useful in those longer sets when I often lose track ("What do you mean I've done 600 yards, it feels like it should be 1000!").

I'm REALLY frustrated with the apps on it, though. I have succeeded in syncying about 25% of my workouts with it. The others just ... disappear. I've been working with Swim.com tech support a little bit and while they're friendly, they're not much help in actually making it work properly. They keep pointing at the Pebble folks.

Having similar issues with the Misfit app and syncing. There is no support for Android syncing and the iOS version is flaky at best.

At times it seems to take forever to connect to phone (Android) or iPad. No other bluetooth devices give me the trouble this watch does.

I will say that as the only user of the Swim.com app at my pool, I'm stupidly pleased at being the leader in all the distance categories, even if my times are absurdly slow.

bama6977

Garmin Swim Watch

nuffer

Followup to my experience with the Pebble watch:
It was pretty good at counting laps and very easy to use. Easy to read when my goggles weren't too foggy.
But for uploading to the Swim.com web site, it was terrible. I don't think it succeeded 1/4 of my swims. I had a few rounds back and forth with the swim.com staff who make the app for the watch and they usually blamed the failures on the Pebble platform. It did not recognize stroke and if you modify your workouts after they've been uploaded to adjust this, you'll lose any achievements you "won" during the workout.

I returned the Pebble and am now using the Garmin Swim watch. It counts distance well and workouts upload successfully with a minimum of fuss. The Garmin app has pretty much all the features found at Swim.com except it doesn't care about your facility. It recognized my freestyle stroke even though my technique could use refining. It lacks pretty much any other feature, like step counting, but for my needs, it's a winner.

Yoyo_Fitness

My friend was happy with Moov so I ordered one but it stopped working after three usage. It counts the laps and strokes and waterproof. The app is okay but not wow. I am exchanging it now but the replacement hasn't arrived yet Neptune also has something similar but it looks very bulky...