The Week in Review is a collection of both all the goodness I’ve written during the past week around the internet, as well as a small pile of links I found interesting – generally endurance sports related. I’ve often wondered what to do with all of the coolness that people write, and while I share a lot of it on Twitter and Facebook, this is a better forum for sending it on to y’all. Most times these different streams don’t overlap, so be on the lookout at all these places for good stuff!
So with that, let’s get into the action!
DCR Posts in the Past Week:
Here’s all the latest on the site, as January plods along:
Wednesday: Garmin ECG Feature Is Now Live: Here’s how it works!
Friday: Strava Responds to Pricing Fiasco, What Strava Costs in Every Country*
Things will start to slowly ramp up this week and into the coming weeks…good times ahead!
YouTube Videos This Past Week:
Here’s what hit the tubes over on the You of Tube, definitely don’t forget to subscribe there to get notified of videos the second they hit!
Stuff I Found Interesting around the Interwebs:
Here’s a not-so-small smattering of all the random things that I stumbled on while doing my civic duty to find the end of the Internet:
1) On Specialized’s Sponsorship Changes and Eric Lagerstrom’s Signing: This is a good article, and something I’ve been talking about for a long time – merely being a fast athlete isn’t good enough to earn sponsorship dollars. And frankly, it really hasn’t been for a long-long time. The entire point of sponsorships in sports is to raise the profile of the sponsoring company (measured any number of ways). It’s a business transaction, that’s it. If an athlete doesn’t do that, then it’s effectively more of a charitable cause (which is fine too, if it’s actually for charity). Eric and Paula do an incredible job of not just raising awareness for the sport of triathlon, what it means to be pro, but also equally as important: Their sponsors. Don’t get me wrong, you can still be a pro athlete and at the top of your game and take home prize purses, but if you want the far more lucrative sponsorship money, you have to find a way to draw your audience in. Sure, there are exceptions when you get to the Messi’s of the world, but for the other 99.99% of pro athletes out there, winning is just one piece of the puzzle.
2) Google Reportedly Working on AirTags Competitor: Would it be too much to ask for these platforms to be halfway compatible in terms of relaying position points? I mean, just asking for a friend.
3) World Surf League Declares Apple Watch as Official Sports Equipment: This seems to imply that not only does each competitor receive a device, but is also seemingly expected to wear it too, to get real-time tracking of data. Of course, Apple isn’t the only game in town for wave stat tracking. But certainly, a notable win. This is using a 3rd party app, versus a built-in feature/app.
4) Hammerhead adds surface type planning to map planner: This is a minor change in the grand scheme of features, but it’s notable that it also notifies you of upcoming surface changes (e.g. pavement to gravel or vice versa), on the unit itself. It’s a nice touch.
5) New Levels for Zwift Runners: Previously these were capped at 21, now there’s up to Level 30.
6) Apple VR headset to feature health/wellness experiences: It’ll be interesting to see if VR headsets of the next few years (from any company) will meaningfully break into the health/fitness realm. One of the challenges for VR headsets (such as this VR demo I did with Zwift years back), is simply sweat proofing. Sweat is far worse to deal with electronically than just plain water, and most headsets aren’t designed for sweat. Meditation won’t likely be a problem, but yoga could certainly be.
7) Two women saved in Canada with Apple Satellite SOS: At this stage, Apple Satellite SOS calls are still relatively interesting/notable. This one being two Canadian women that tried to re-route around some road closures and ended up in a snowbank deep in the forest without cell coverage. In this case no helicopters or such were needed, they were able to get local police up this road to sort them out (whereas nobody was going up that road anytime soon otherwise). Easily solved with satellite connectivity, but potentially deadly without it.
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With that, thanks for reading!
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Ray, what are your thoughts on the Giant Group investing in Stages? Asking as an SB20 owner.
For consumers it’s only a good thing I’d think. Keep in mind that Stages already had a partnership with Giant, as when they launched the latest gen bike computers a year ago, one was under a Giant branded banner (same models/firmware/etc, just two branding options).
Inversely, I could see it giving Stages more funds to double-down on perhaps an SB20 bike refresh.
Any rumours about a Karoo 3 this or next year Ray?
I woud love to step over from Garmin.
To me, it’s expected. Just a question of when. Obviously, late spring is a smart timeframe to launch a bike computer. Though, some have done it end of summer too (but that’s sorta out of fashion now).
The big-ticket items I’d be looking for are:
A) Better battery
B) UI a crapton faster
C) Proper smartphone app/integration
Honestly, anything else beyond that is just icing, given their existing units continue to see strong updates every few weeks.
Hi Ray,
What are your thoughts on the Garmin FR 265 and 965 rumors? Only 9 months after the launch of the 255 and 955.
I guess that Ray has signed some form of NDA with Garmin, so he can’t comment on that before the official release. I’m sure we will see his reviews on the launch day for both devices.
On the other hand, my personal opinion is that releasing 265/965 is very unfortunate decision. Especially if 955 is still not in the state of reliable device (just scroll through Garmin forums how many issues are being reported every day and are still not fixed). I think that Garmin needs to start focusing on quality instead of quantity. Also, the accuracy of the 955’s (and 255’s, too) selling features like HRV status is very questionable, at least. Then we have a half-baked Physio True-up (e.g. not syncing body battery, HRV)… I could go on with the Garmin current issues…
Index S2 software update came out, they claim “Body Metric Improvements”. Not sure if it’s any better. They made a video on how to force update your scale.
Yup. I haven’t noticed any difference with my S2.
Weirdly, you have to manually update it. Flip over the scale do some battery stuff, press some buttons, etc… They sent out a video via e-mail a few days ago: link to youtube.com
I frankly fail to understand how on earth Garmin, on their 2nd gen device, doesn’t have an auto-update process for a WiFi scale that can connect whenever the heck it wants to update. What?!?!?!
This update has BRICKED all devices that took the update. After the software update, the scale does not sync to Garmin Connect anymore.
link to forums.garmin.com
I just noticed that the Garmin Connect app now has a “Set Body Composition” option for the Index S2:
“The values you enter below will be used by your Garmin Index S3 Smart Scale to estimate future body composition metrics. We recommend entering recent values from a trusted source, such as a DXA scan or another reputable body composition measurement.”
Fields include: Date of Measurement, Body Fat %, and Skeletal Muscle Mass (optional).
Ray, it would be awesome if you could review the effectiveness of the new feature sometime… help me (and others) decide if its worth forking out for a DXA (or equivalent) scan just to calibrate this thing? 🙂
Cheers.
Oops, “S3” was a typo… was meant to be “S2” of course 😉
Hello Ray,
What are your thoughts regarding a new form factor, in the form of a ring, coming from mayor brands like Garmin that can track all the wellness data used for advance options like training suggestion?
I would be really interested on it, as is a bit tiring such a cluncking watch 24/7 and I prefer to use on my day to day my automatic watch. This way you use 24/7 the ring and the garmin watch when you train.
Do you see this feaseble in the future?
Thanks,
ME
I’m not sure. I suppose maybe very long term, but if i were Garmin (or Apple) I’d probably sit on it for a while and let the battery/sensor tech mature.
The other challenge, is that from a SKU standpoint it’s a nightmare. Oura has 8 ring sizes, each with 8 different-sized chargers. Now, multiply that by the number of model finishes/colors you have, and it just compounds over and over again. In this case, Oura has two styles (Horizon and Heritage) and ~5 colors per style. My brain hurts at the number of combinations we’re talking here to stock (~80 styles combos). And while that’s semi-viable for direct-to-consumer, since it’s all Oura does, it’s not viable for retailers/distributors (which is what Apple/Garmin/etc do).
Not to mention sizing as a process. Oura does that with a ring sizing kit, which means they send you a bunch of fake plastic rings, and then you size/test, and then order correct size. The challenge there is barrier to intsa-purchase, as well as cost of shipping the sizing kits out.
Obviously, Apple & Garmin have their own SKU nightmares, but for retailers, they can pick the most popular SKU’s. With Oura, you can’t, as your baseline is literally the size of someon’s finger.
I am kind of surprise that you did not feature the new underwater bike parking here 😀
Or are you planning to shot your own video about it?
Planning to shoot something myself. Giving it a few days to settle in. I believe today is the last day for the older/other parking garages for people to have bikes out of it.
Are you allowed to fly drones through it? 😉
Hi Ray
Any idea when the Garmin 965 will be released? Will you be offering a discount code if we order it through one of your “partners”? ty
Hey Ray, could you shed some light on today’s situation regarding Garmin’s Physio Trueup? What does it really do and what does it not do, both in the unified version and the old version? Equally important, how well does it perform in your experience? And how does it work with one device that does and one that doesn’t have the unified PhT?
I have used the old PhT in the past with a FR935 and Edge 830, found it rather wonky. I have recently replaced the FR with an Epix2. That has the new unified version, but the 830 hasn’t. To my surprise, the GC app is only showing me one status now, which is identical to the Epix. The toggle between devices isn’t there. On the 830, the numbers are still different, although they seem closer than before. Is GC simply only showing the numbers of the preferred/primary device, or it something more than that? And can the Epix use the data from the 830 in an improved way, even though the latter doesn’t support unified? I assume at least I’ll have to accept the 830 isn’t getting improved results, thanks to the Epix’ unified PhT?
Tnx!!