Gadgets and Kit

Now as well as being an international standard athlete eater, I also consider myself to be a little bit of a geek. Nothing weird just the usual sci-fi, video games, computers, and gadgets.

Well that makes me a lucky boy, as running and the like is one of the most gadget-ed and stat-ed up recreational actives you can manage I think! Everything has it's little variations, numbers, graphs and tech which catches my interest. It's not like I chose the sport for it, it kind of crept up all around me. So what do we have.

Well...

I currently own and use a GPS watch, in particular a Polar M400.

Aint it pretty?

This took over from my old faithful Garmin Forerunner 15 at the start of the year, something which I picked over a Forerunner 10 as it was 8 hours battery vs 5 hours and I was worried the battery in the 10 would go before I could get round a marathon!

This then links up to an app, which links up to Strava, which analyses all my stuff and tells me how slow I went, along with maps, splits...  All very stat-tastic.

But it doesn't stop there, I have variations in trainer depending on the surface (or I should I only have the 2... trail and road), my clothing is all designed to be warm, or cool, or resist water, or erflect light so I can be seen in the dark. My shorts have other shorts under them which help support my hamstrings so prevent injury, I can wear tights (yeah I don't care) which also support lower leg and help prevent shin splints, or I have supports that do that on their own.

I even have a top which must have been designed to make me look like a whale. No, before you say it, that's not all of my tops, just 80%.

I honestly can't think of too many situations where there wasn't some consideration about what my things will do for me.

So many reasons to love running, and the gadgety side of things is another!

Equally however, every run could be done with a vest a pair of shorts and a sense of direction. But would it engage me as much? Probably not.