Running with TomTom Cardio

You may remember a while back we brought you news of the TomTom Cardio watch release that came accompanied with the controversial Alexandria Morgan ‘strapless’ advert.  Well fast-forward a few months and I have finally got a chance to review the rather cool gizmo for myself.  You will no doubt be pleased to hear however there is no video of me running to accompany this review…I’ll leave that to Alexandria.

So what actually is the TomTom Cardio?  Simply put the TomTom Cardio is a sports watch with some breakthrough technology that can measure and assist with various aspects of your workout, including the big feature – the strapless heart rate monitor.  If you have not tried an old school heart rate monitor yourself you have no doubt seen one on tv, you know the kind of thing that looks like a science experience and features a guy running on a treadmill attached to all sorts of wires?

The simplicity of the watch means you simply strap it on your wrist and are ready for your run, it really couldn’t be any more straight forward than that.  The LED optical sensor which sits on your wrist takes your heartbeat reading and feeds this back onto the watch display, making it easier for you to keep tabs on.  Depending on how you set up the watch prior to your run it can tell you whether or not you need to be working harder or not to meet your personal targets.

These days more and more of us are favouring short workouts in which we work to out maximum capacity instead of spending hours in the gym at any one time.  It was for this reason I loved was the interval training mode. Unless I have a trainer with me I normally find it annoying to keep track of work and rest periods accurately but with a small vibrate the TomTom lets you know when it is time to go and then time to stop again.  You set how many sequences you wish to do and how long you wish these to be and the watch then guides you through the workout.

So did I rate it?  Well in a word yes.  I won’t like when I say I was dubious at first that this was just another faddy fitness watch but I was really pleasantly surprised by the features and ease of use of the device.  The gps which maps your running and distance seem’s pretty much stop on (it is TomTom after all) and the easy to program functions meant I could pretty much pick up the watch and use it without having to read screed’s of instructions.  I tested the run function initially by inputting my target distance.  The watch lets you know by means of a vibration when you it 50% of your target then again at 90% and finally on completion.

Priced from RRP £219.99 it may not be cheap but for an accurate tool to monitor your progress I think it is a good investment for anyone serious about fitness.