I grew up in the eighties, and 90s, and so computing, open source software and the world wide web grew up with me. In that time we went from going to magazine shops to buy mags, and cd shops to buy CDs, and book shops to buy books. We also took photos on rolls of films and then took those rolls to La Combe or the Garden Centre to have the films processed, and then we put them in albums.
I like Garmin Connect and the Garmin Instinct 2. Both the app, and the device are good and they’re reliable for tracking sports on a daily basis. Having said this, I felt the urge to slide back to my Suunto devices and the Suunto app. For many, many, many years I was very happy with suunto getting two dive computers, one feature watch an ambit 2, ambit 3, Suunto Spartan and Peak 5.
There was a time, for decades, if not centuries, when a watch provided us with the time. We would wear it in a pocket, attached to a chain, we would stare up at a clock tower and we would see the time. We might even hear church bells to indicate every quarter, half and full hour. In the last decade we have gone from wearing watches to tell time, to watches that quantify us.
Since Strava has decided to sue Garmin, and since Suunto has decided to sue Garmin as well, for different reasons, I feel now is a good opportunity to remind ourselves of how to upload to Garmin and Strava manually.
If you record an activity with a Garmin device, you can navigate to connect.garmin.com, log in and go to the activity. You can export file, TCX or GPX. I usually export the file, double click, and then use the .fit file to upload to Strava. You can add a name, photos etc.
In the 2000s I was using a Nokia N95 8gb with Sports tracker to track my walks every day. Eventually, when I started scuba diving I switched to Suunto to track dives, and eventually wore one for hikes, and then I upgraded to the Suunto Ambit 2, 3, Spartan Wrist HR Baro and then the Peak 5.
At the same time as I was jumping from one watch to another Sports Tracker was growing, and then Suunto bought it, and it became Movescount and this app was truly fantastic. I really loved the web app. It then became the Suunto App. Sports Tracker and the Suunto App are iterations of the same app. The Sports tracker app plays nicely with the Apple Watch, among other apps, whereas the Suunto app plays nicely with Suunto and Xiaomi devices.
For years I have used Sportstracker, and then Strava and Komoot and others. Whether I use one platform or another isn’t much of a concern. I can send my data everywhere. The question is whether I make that data public, private, or a hybrid compromise.
With Suunto and Sportracker I usually keep almost everything private because I can’t highlight zones that I want to keep private. With Komoot it requires cropping the start and end point to hide where you live. With Strava you highlight where you live, work, where friends live or work and then it automatically hides activities to and from those points. Specifically it hides the first 200 meters or more, depending on how privacy conscious you are.
I see people. I see them say that they have given up on wearing fitness trackers and smartwatches because they hate the tyranny of the device. I have felt an intense dislike for Apple behaves in particular. At the same time I have been playing wit Sportstracker for eighteen years or so. My fitness tracking habit is old enough to drink and old enough to drive.
This isn’t a post about drinking, or driving. This is a post about having a healthy relationship with your Garmin Instinct 2, your Suunto Peak 5, your Apple Watch SE, your Xiaomi Smartband 9 Pro and many other devices over the decades. it’s about wearing them, without displaying addictive behaviours. It’s about co-existence.
For years I wore no watch, and then I took up scuba diving, and then I wanted to wear a watch when climbing, and then it escalated from there. Now I have Garmin, Suunto Apple, Casio, Xiaomi and other watches. It’s easy to justify wearing the Apple watch because it’s a smart watch so it has a niche. It’s harder to justify the Garmin, Suunto, Xiaomi and Casio watches because they overlap each other.
Yesterday I wore the Suunto Peak 5 alongside the Apple Watch SE rather than the Apple Watch SE and Garmin device as I usually would. The reason for this is that I want to continue playing with Suunto devices, and I’d like to wean myself off of the Apple Watch, for at least a week or two.
In the process of doing this I was reminded that although the Apple watch is pivotal within the iOS app ecosystem Garmin is very well connected with other services. I share Garmin data with 11 services. These services are Adidas Running, AllTrails, Asics runkeeper, Decathlon (added today), komoot, Nike, Ride with GPS, Strava, TrainAsOne, Walk the Distance and Zwift.
People will always ask me why I wear two watches and the answer is now “because one is a smart watch and the other is for sports, and people accept that quite easily. The reasons I used to give are no longer needed. I learned how to keep a short answer convenient, and easy to accept.
I saw an article today that said that people prefer the Series 8 and 9 to the Apple Watch SE and the Ultra. Of course this makes sense, because the Ultra is expensive and fills one niche, and the SE is cheap and fills another niche. The Series 8 and 9 watches showcase the newest tech at an affordable price point for many.