HR while swimming with wrist worn external device

Former Member over 8 years ago

I'm considering getting a F5 (or F5X) mainly for swimming. I was hoping that the HR function wouldn't be unactivated but it apparently is.

So I'm considering getting a Mio Fuse or a Vivosmart or else to get my HR while swimming. I saw the thread related to the F3 explaining why the watch could not record the data which can just be checked live.

Any clue that this might be different for the F5 ? Or any clue that Garmin may allow users to activate the HR for swimming activities in a fw update at a later stage ?

I guess the answers are both no but I am still hoping :-)

0 KrzysiekJar over 7 years ago

Do you know if it still works?

Hi everybody,

Completely incidentally, I discovered a way to enable wrist HRM while swimming.

I created a multisport activity with hiking, then swimming, then again hiking.
To my great surprise, the watch didn't disable HRM while I was swimming (open water). I got both all the usual swimming stats AND heart rate.
I guess it's a programming omission: apparently the wrist HRM is disabled only for the builtin pool and open water swimming apps.
Now, looking at the recorded heart rate I can appreciate why Garmin disabled it: the accuracy is obviously not there, though it gives SOME idea of what your heart is doing.
Also, this will probably be fixed in the next release of the firmware (I'm using version 2.20).

FWIW - enjoy!

Mark

0 Maruzko over 6 years ago

Do you know if it still works?

Completely incidentally, I discovered a way to enable wrist HRM while swimming.

I created a multisport activity with hiking, then swimming, then again hiking.
To my great surprise, the watch didn't disable HRM while I was swimming (open water). I got both all the usual swimming stats AND heart rate.
I guess it's a programming omission: apparently the wrist HRM is disabled only for the builtin pool and open water swimming apps.
Now, looking at the recorded heart rate I can appreciate why Garmin disabled it: the accuracy is obviously not there, though it gives SOME idea of what your heart is doing.
Also, this will probably be fixed in the next release of the firmware (I'm using version 2.20).
]
:)

Just tried this on a Fenix 5X on FW 11.0.
Made a multi sport activity with Walk-PoolSwim-Walk and it didnt work.
The OHR is turned off during the Pool Swim 8-(