The battle for your active wrist heated up a little today as Suunto announced that they’ve added a barometer to their Spartan Sport Wrist HR GPS multisport watch. The Spartan Sport, which competes directly with Garmin’s fenix line of watches, also got a battery life bump. We’d still choose the fenix given the choice, however it’s good to see that Suunto hasn’t given up the fight yet. For cyclists who’ve had enough of Garmin this watch is a good choice. For the official word from Suunto (including all the details) please follow the jump.
Suunto Spartan Sport Wrist HR Baro
Today, Suunto is launching a Spartan Sport Wrist HR watch with barometric pressure – this is the outdoor performance GPS watch many have been asking for. You get the best of the Spartan Sport, including best-in-class wrist-based HR from Valencell, plus barometric pressure measurement for more accurate elevation data and storm alerts. Press release is attached.
In addition, with the software update schedule for Oct. 17, there’s a battery-life bump coming, which will take this unit’s life to 20hrs with power-saving options enabled (up to 40hrs with a 1-minute GPS fix rate).
In addition to standard activity tracking data like distance, pace, HR, etc., Suunto delivers functional data like EPOC (Excess Post-exercise Oxygen Consumption) and PTE (Peak Training Effect) for athletes that demand more information. Athletes can also pull training plans onto the watch to guide their daily workouts, get regular checkups on their progress across sports in an easy-to-read infographic, and use 24-hour HR monitoring to inform their rest and recovery needs. They can also monitor daily steps and calories burned, and set targets for each.
Like the original, Spartan Sport Wrist HR Baro features a color touchscreen to navigate the user-friendly Spartan OS. On-screen navigation using activity-specific heat maps from Suunto Movescount aids in route discovery around the world. Eighty pre-built sport modes come standard, with customizable screens providing unlimited options for in-activity views. White case and band match with a gold bezel for an athletic, stylish aesthetic.
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Key features:
Activity-specific heatmaps on movescount.com can be used to find popular trails (or unpopular trails), which can be traced into routes and then downloaded to the watch for navigation on the go
The Valencell PerformTek optical heart rate sensor is best in class, used by biometrics manufacturers for highly accurate HR measurement FusedAlti™ technology combines GPS and barometric data for more precise altitude information. The watch will also display sunrise/sunset times, and gives storm alarms when a sudden drop in air pressure occurs
Glass: Mineral Crystal
Bezel: Stainless Steel
Case: Polyamide
Strap: Silicone
Battery Life: 20 hours in training mode (up to 40h with power saving options)
Navigation: GPS/GLONASS
Water Resistance: 100m
Weight: 74g
Width: 46mm
Thickness: 16.7mm
MSRP: $549
