Graham Steel

I recently bought a cheapie-cheapie fitness tracker watch, the Blackview R1, £15 on Amazon. I was most interested in monitoring my sleep - do I really need more sleep than I did a few years ago, or is my sleep quality poor? The fitness tracker comes with a heart rate monitor and an interactive display, but it must be paired with a "GloryFit" app on the phone - I think it is the app which does most of the work. I did not expect high accuracy from such a cheap device, but one surprise is, when out for a bike ride, how readily the app announces "Heart rate exceeds warning limit, please adjust your speed". The announcement does tend to correlate with when I am climbing, but I need not be on the sections of the route that I consider particularly challenging, and the warning comes up. I am inclined to dismiss the warnings as the price to pay for having invested in such a cheap fitness tracker. But I can't help wondering - what if it is actually true, I do have a heart condition which shows itself during more intense exercise, which has not caused me any notable problems to date? I could spend three times the amount on a chest strap heart rate monitor, which I understand is expected to provide more accurate measurements. Or for that price, I could get a much better fitness tracker. Just wondering what other people's experience of fitness trackers are when out on the bike. However, earlier today, I was out for a walk - not a particularly challenging walk, and three quarters of the way around, the app announced "Heart rate exceeds warning limit, please adjust your speed". That can't be true - I was not feeling breathless or anything at that point on the walk.

On the trails