A Watch
On my racing bike I have a Wahoo Element Bolt and sensors for speed, cadence and power. On my gravel bike I have none of that.
As I started doing longer bike trips I realised I didn’t really want all that information. I don’t care about speed, just the time and how long it is to my destination. I want to enjoy the ride. I don’t want to maintain an average speed, or care about my power.
These trips are for enjoying the ride. So I started using my watch that I use for running and hiking instead to record the trips. The advantages:
- The battery lasts for ever
- I have to manually look at my wrist to see information
- I have only the information I care about and nothing else
- A few less gadgets to worry about
I’ve been using the Coros Pace 2 for a while now and love it. It offers “20 Days For Regular Use/30 Hours In Full GPS Mode”. I’m not sure about that, but I haven’t had to charge it on any trip so far.
Controls are two buttons which are easy to operate in the cold, rain or when you are tired. It does what I want, records activity and tells me the information I need. Would highly recommend if you want something simple.
In comparison my Apple Watch died before I completed a marathon (admittedly a long one up a mountain). The Apple Watch was so complicated it did random stuff and was hard to read and operate. In the cold, rain or when sweaty it would be so hard to use.