Heart Rate Monitor Review

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What To Look For

Heart rate monitors come with a lot of built-in features, so the best thing is to find the features that will help the most. Mountain bikers, cross-country runners and skiers would probably find a GPS feature handy. Those in water sports need waterproofing. Anyone training with long rides or runs on featureless tracks or roads could use a radio as a diversion. There are a lot of features to look for, so the main thing is to think about what you are training to do and find the features that are most useful.

Common Pitfalls

An easy-to-overlook problem for new heart rate monitor buyers, especially for those who wear glasses or contacts, is to focus on features and to forget about whether the critical piece of information--the heart rate readout--is easy to read. It doesn't do a lot of good to buy a heart rate monitor if switching from the stopwatch feature to the heart rate requires fumbling with a tiny button, or if the readout is too small to be seen easily.

Where To Buy

Heart rate monitors are pretty utilitarian by nature. In brick-and-mortar stores, they are typically boxed and shelved, making trying them on a problem most of the time. Furthermore, you won't really know about any small differences in comfort until you are using it. A shopper who is comfortable with online purchases should go hunting for bargains.

Cost

Prices vary with brand and how many features have been added. A bargain basement, basic wristwatch monitor can be had for as little as $30 as of September 2009. A Polar CS600 with its training program software, heart rate data recording, stopwatch and other clock features, altimeter, calorie counter and other features costs about $420.

Accessories

The main accessory is a chest strap. Many models come packaged with one, so if this is desired, it is easy enough to get one included.