Polar ProTrainer XT Heart Rate Monitor - Now You Can Get Serious About Your Training!
Written: Apr 08 '01 (Updated Apr 10 '01)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Many useful features included in this model, a good value.
Cons: The watch is very large, the zone/timer beeper is hard to hear in heavy traffic.
The Bottom Line: Many people believe that heart rate monitor training, along with speed training, are the keys to improving your fitness. The Polar Protrainer XT will help get you there.
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| randilyn's Full Review: Polar Protrainer XT |
Polar Protrainer XT Heart Rate Monitor Features
The Polar Protrainer XT comes in two pieces, as do all Polar heart rate monitors. There is the transmitter you wear around your chest that measures your heart rate. This information is transmitted to the second piece, the receiver, which you wear on your wrist just like a watch.
The transmitter can either be strapped around you with the elastic strap that came with it, or it can be worn inside a Polar-designed bra top (ladies, this is a good option because you don't have to worry about hiding the strap under your top, although the top is a bit overpriced).
The Polar Protrainer XT has a good mix of features that are useful to the intermediate/advanced runner, all in one unit.
* Stopwatch
* Measures up to 48 split/lap times
* Measures average heart rate by split/lap
* Three adjustable heart-rate zones
* Two adjustable timers
* Recovery timer
* Cycling functions: odometer, average and maximum speed and trip distance (requires a separate Polar Speed Sensor, which I don't have and will not discuss further here).
I think this is an excellent mix of features for the price. My husband purchased the Polar Protrainer XT for me as a Christmas gift from RoadRunnerSports.com.
Hint: if you are shopping for a heart rate monitor, sign up for the newsletter at roadrunnersports.com. They will e-mail you when heart rate monitors go on sale. The best sale I have ever seen on monitors was a few weeks before Christmas, when some models were over 50% off!
Why are these features useful?
Almost all of these features can be used for a typical running workout. I will illustrate how the features on the Polar Protrainer XT can be used for a tempo run. A tempo run is done at a pace close to your race pace for a prolonged period of time, also known as a lactate threshold or anaerobic threshold run.
Stopwatch: used to measure the total time of my workout. Pressed once at the beginning of my workout, and again at the end. My average and maximum heart rate for the entire workout will also be measured.
Measure laps: I push the red button on the bottom of the watch at three times during my workout: after finishing my warmup, when I finish the first half of my tempo run, and when I finish the last half of my tempo run (I run out and back courses which are usually more uphill the first half than the second). This way I have split my workout into four chunks with the time run and average heart rate measured for each chunk.
Target Heart Rate Zones: I use two pre-programmed target heart rate zones during a tempo workout. The first zone was set with no minimum and a maximum of 65% of my maximum heart rate. This zone is used for my warm up and warm down. This zone is important because the watch will beep if my heart rate exceeds the set maximum, indicating I am going too fast during the warm up or cool down.
The second zone was set with a minimum and maximum of 80% to 85% of my maximum heart rate. This zone is used for the tempo portion of my run. The watch will beep if I'm running too fast, or too slow. A quick glance at the watch will tell you whether you are over or under your target. To change your zone, you only have to press a single button during your run. If you only use two target zones, pressing the button will switch between the two zones. If you have set the third zone, pressing the button will switch between all three.
After the workout, I can see how long I spent exercising within, above, and below my target heart rate zones. When I see that I spent more time within my zone, I can tell that I have improved.
Using two timers: I set the first timer for 10 minutes. This is used for my warm up and cool down. I set the second timer for 30 minutes. This is used for my tempo run. Since these timers are preset, they can be used for run after run with no additional input. Ten minutes after the stopwatch is started the watch will beep, signaling the end of my warmup. Thirty minutes later the watch will beep again, signaling the end of my tempo run. Ten minutes after that, the watch will beep again, signaling the end of my cool down. So easy!
Recovery timer: This will show you how much your heart rate drops after the end of your workout. You can activate the recovery timer after you stop the stopwatch by hitting the red button on the watch. I have the recovery timer set for 10 minutes.
Ease of Use
The Polar Protrainer XT has 4 buttons on it which control all of the functions described above. In addition, these buttons are used to set the time and turn on the backlight.
This watch was intimidating to me when I first received it. For awhile there, I thought I would never figure out how to use it. The instructions that came with the monitor were kind of confusing. You have to pay close attention to the instructions and press the buttons in the right order to set the watch correctly.
I learned how to use this watch by setting all of the timers and zones, and not changing them for each run. At first, I only used the heart rate measurement and stopwatch functions. After getting comfortable with doing this and reading the data the watch stored after the workout, I started using the lap function and the recovery function. After a few weeks of doing this, I was comfortable enough to start using more than one heart rate zone during a single workout.
Now I can pretty much work the watch without the instructions. This took me about two months of consistent use of the monitor. For some of you more mechanically-inclined people, it might not take you nearly so long to figure out this watch.
Gripes
While I really like the Polar Protrainer XT, I do have a couple of gripes about it. Occasionally the heart rate will soar for no apparent reason (must be interference from somewhere???), so this causes an unrealistic max heart rate for the whole workout. Fortunately, this does not happen very often.
Also, the size of the watch is very large. I'm a woman with a fairly small wrist, so the watch looks kind of funny on me.
Finally, when I am running on a road with heavy traffic, I can't hear the beep when I am above or below my zone. To compensate, if I think I hear a beep I hold my wrist to my ear. Every few seconds, I do this again to see if it is beeping (when I run in the dark) or glance quickly at my watch to see how I'm doing.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
randilyn
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Location: Las Vegas, NV
Reviews written: 101
Trusted by: 56 members
About Me:
I own a candle and spa accessories business. My real job = financial analyst.
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