Over Land and Under Sea: Freestyle and Tech4o
Over the years we’ve looked at watches that will do everything from tracking your sleep cycles to monitoring your activity levels. Of course every watch we’ve looked at tells time, in some capacity or another, and today’s watches are no different. But true to form, these watches are also unique and it feels like they can do nearly everything short of making you lunch.
Freestyle is well known for making diving watches, capable of being water-resistant up to 100 metres, with a warranty that backs the claim. They are more concerned about making a durable and dependable timepiece than anything trendy or flashy, though in the process they’ve come up with some very stylish active watches. The Navigator 2.0 is no exception. Ours is black with a black face, and before we even go into the technical details of this watch it’s clear that Freestyle has put some thought into comfort. The strap has “free fit” technology, meaning that it has a mesh strip that the buckle can attach to at any point, instead of pre-punched holes. Anyone who has had to punch their own hole in a belt or watch to get it to fit properly will appreciate a free-fit strap. A good number of the staff here at TO have very thin wrists, and found that this watch was more comfortable to wear than some other watches because of the ability to fully customize the final position of the buckle.
Even though it’s a men’s watch, the Navigator 2.0 isn’t terribly large, measuring roughly 3/4 of an inch across the face, and the fairer members of our staff found it acceptable to wear. The buttons are flush with the face, which is a pro and a con; pro because the buttons don’t dig into your wrist when you’re wearing it, con because they’re more difficult to push when you’re trying to set the timer or any of the numerous functions. Speaking of functions, probably the coolest is the digital compass, which shows 16 cardinal directions with 1 degree resolution, which is nice for those of us who are always slightly unsure of which direction we’re heading. The Navigator 2.0 also has a date/time function, three alarms and a timer with two intervals, and a 30 lap memory chronograph. Look for Freestyle’s Navigator 2.0 in almost any store that watches are sold, as well as online directly from Freestyle or from retailers like Amazon, for around $105.
While we’ve not yet reviewed a true GPS watch, our next specimen comes close. The Trail Leader Pro from Tech4o does a mind-boggling number of things. Yes, this watch will tell you the time, among a myriad of other things, like give you the weather forecast, monitor your heart rate, keep track of barometric pressure and your altitude, provide you with a dead-on accurate stopwatch and count-down timer with an alarm, monitor your pace of activity, give you the current temperature, tell you which direction you’re headed with the compass, and sing you to sleep at night. Okay, maybe it won’t sing you to sleep, but it will most certainly do all of the other things. Chances are, if you’re out doing enough activity to utilize all of these functions you don’t need a nighttime lullaby anyhow, in fact, we’re amazed that you still have enough energy to read this!
This watch has a built in accelerometer, which will track your MPH and distance traveled without the need of an external pedometer attached to your foot. The accelerometer-based Exercise Mode will keep track of not only your speed and distance, but also things like calories burned, steps taken and what your exercise pace is. It’s necessary to input an estimated stride-length and the accuracy of the information the watch gives you is largely dependent on your ability to put in an accurate measurement. This can take a try or two to really get right, so do your testing on an area where you are sure of your distance before you take this too far from home. A 2.4GHz Heart Rate Monitor, which straps around your chest and we found to be quite comfortable, keeps track of your high and low heart rates, as well as keeping track of your target heart rate. Of course with any piece of equipment that keeps track of this much information there is an expected learning curve, navigating all of these different menus with a limited number of buttons can be a bit frustrating until you know the proper order they’re in. The battery, which is rechargeable, lasts for around 9 hours, which should be long enough to complete even the longest foot-races. The access to the battery on both the watch and the heart-rate monitor are quite easy to get to and use. Look for the Trail Leader Pro directly from Tech4o.com for around $200, and be sure to consider the various feature sets available on the Trail Leader 1, 2, and Pro models.
