What type of practice aids do you use?

RE: What type of practice aids do you use?

Former Member — Wed, 19 Nov 2014 15:27:18 GMT

Thanks to everyone for responding to my survey! As of right now, I'm thinking about making a type of belt that incorporates a parachute, power tower cord, pull buoy strap, bungee cords, and a clip on drag suit. The parachute, power tower cord, and bungees would be interchangeable. As for the heart rate monitor, I might be able to incorporate a heart rate monitor with a display on a watch. It would have to be similar to the Polar E600 heart rate monitors. If anyone has any advice, or ideas of things they would like for me to try to incorporate, just post it on this thread and I'll do my best to include it as well.

RE: What type of practice aids do you use?

Patrick W. Brundage — Sat, 15 Nov 2014 01:35:41 GMT

Agreed, but they're not even pretending to be ready for prime time. They're not claiming to be finished. I'm one of the initial group of 40 to test it. There's lots left to do. I'm assuming they'll get the measurements right, eventually. If they do, they're in business. If they don't, they're toast. As for the apparent bulkiness, once I found a pair of goggles that fit both me & the device, I got used to it in a hurry.Thanks, Judd. I'll keep my eyes on this (no pun intended). It would be great, when it gets finished/formally launched, if you post back your impressions of it.

RE: What type of practice aids do you use?

StewartACarroll — Fri, 14 Nov 2014 08:23:04 GMT

I answered your survey but I too don't really have any issue with equipment in your survey. The one item I use but would love some improvements on is the tempo trainer. I would like two sounds with different time settings; one for stroke tempo, say .75 seconds and one for split settings, such as 28.5 seconds for a 50. If there was also a method of setting a reset time such as 2mins, so that you could tie this to a send off time on the set it would be awesome. If these mods were made I would likely use the tempo trainer everyday during our race pace sets.

RE: What type of practice aids do you use?

Swimosaur — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 12:20:36 GMT

... the biggest swim aid I find lacking is an effective, convenient and accurate heart-rate monitoring device ... Working on it ... my current take here. More

RE: What type of practice aids do you use?

Patrick W. Brundage — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 11:59:08 GMT

Chris, I did the survey, but wanted to add something - the biggest swim aid I find lacking is an effective, convenient and accurate heart-rate monitoring device. The ones on the market are clunky (e.g., Aquapulse attaches to earlobe and goggles) and do not consistently work effectively. If I had my dream device, it would be a heart rate monitor that ... worked in the water looked/fit like the Nike Fuel Band (or similar) had a SOLE function of heart rate measurement and a simple, singular read out screen that communicated this Caveat - I am a NOT a fan of devices that try to do too many things at once as, in my experience, it usually means a sub-par experience across all of the functions. Think "iPod-simple" in terms of design philosophy and feature/function set. My :2cents: FWIW.

RE: What type of practice aids do you use?

orca1946 — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 11:41:34 GMT

OK I hope this helps.

RE: What type of practice aids do you use?

Swimosaur — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 06:32:31 GMT

I fully realize the technology is challenging, but this looks bulky and I'm concerned about the "too-low" lows it measured ... Agreed, but they're not even pretending to be ready for prime time. They're not claiming to be finished. I'm one of the initial group of 40 to test it. There's lots left to do. I'm assuming they'll get the measurements right, eventually. If they do, they're in business. If they don't, they're toast. As for the apparent bulkiness, once I found a pair of goggles that fit both me & the device, I got used to it in a hurry.

RE: What type of practice aids do you use?

Patrick W. Brundage — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 06:11:55 GMT

Working on it ... my current take here. MoreThanks, Judd. No pun intended, but I'll keep my eye on this. I fully realize the technology is challenging, but this looks bulky and I'm concerned about the "too-low" lows it measured. I got an Aquapulse awhile back and gave up on it when I just kept getting too many clearly erroneous readings. I think I'll have to wait for the technology to mature a bit ... it's clearly on the right track, but I want something I don't notice and that works exceptionally well. I realize that probably makes me a prima donna user, but there you go ;)

RE: What type of practice aids do you use?

flystorms — Wed, 12 Nov 2014 09:54:42 GMT

Just did it. Good luck with the results and we'd love to see what you come up with. :)