I've been using the Spartan Trainer for a good month now and while I like the screen & simplified interface over my older Ambit 3 Sport, it seems less accurate in several areas:

• HR - Wrist-based - Wildly off for a mile or so (over 200 - I'd be nearly dead then). It goes in and out of reliability, it seems. My Ambit 3 came with chest strap. A year later it started eating batteries quickly. I took it apart and it was all corroded inside (Yes, I used it in OW swims.) I bought a Schosche Rhythm+. It seemed pretty decent, not as good as the chest strap and if I wore it adjacent to my watch, it would work in water... sort of. It would occasionally drop out. It got worse and worse on drop outs and often, it wouldn't even turn off. One of the lights went out, too. I took it apart - yep, corrosion inside. I tossed it out and bought the Spartan Trainer.
• GPS while OW Swimming - The Spartan is WAAAY off the mark. A known 3000 or so yard swim showed up as over 5000 yards and it showed that I ended my swim up on top of the cliff behind the beach. I know, for sure, I stopped it as I stood up, exiting the water. None of my known OW swims have shown correctly on the Trainer. My Ambit 3 appears very accurate, and therefore, I am keeping it just for OW swims, unfortunately without HR data.
• Pool Swimming - While neither watch gets laps right, the totals always seem correct. Both watches "detect" your stroke. The Ambit 3 has a function where it learns your stroke and I'd say, after teaching it, it's maybe 50% accurate. The Trainer has no such feature and tells me most of the time I'm swimming breaststroke, when, in fact, I'm freestyling.
• Running, trail running, bike - Both watches perform great, with the HR issues, though, mentioned above.

---

Proud member of FISHTWITCH: doing a bit more than fish exercise now.

Hey JanneK, are there plans for any further updates to the Spartan Ultra? I am on 1.12.36, the most recent version, which came out back in January. There's lots of space for further improvement and I really hope there'll be more updates to come.

---

----------------------------------------------------------------

Yes. There is updates coming. Next one is quite soonish. Cant say the date yet. Pace / power zones features.

What would you mainly like to have? What would be things you would expect to have in Spartan?

---

—

Thanks for the response! What would I like...hmmm.

1. Drill mode in pool swimming.

2. Auto sync to the phone app without user intervention.

3. More watch face options.

4. Ability to choose GPS, Stryd (or neither) on the watch for speed and pace.

5. See (1.)!

---

----------------------------------------------------------------

Hi Janne,

The biggest lack of feature is the lack of the workout builder -- which I believe the Ambit series used to have via the phone app. While the onboard "interval" function is nice for last minute workouts, I'd want to plan ahead and set up custom workouts to be able to use on my watch.

For example, a swim workout could be: 300y warm up, 5x100 with 15 seconds rest, 2x400, 200y cool down. Or a run workout being 1.5 mile warmup, 800m, 1200m, 1600m, 1200m, 800m with 60 seconds rest between, cool down. My Garmin is also set up for a power zone bike workout - so I can do say 6x5 minutes at between 220-240w with 3 minutes of rest.

With Garmin (and the Ambit from what I've read) you can easily set these workouts up. With the Spartan, you simply can't, which to me limits its use as a training watch.

Also, for the models with an oHR, from what I've read, the 24/7 HR data isn't downloaded into your account and is only accessible on your watch. This kind of limits ability to review past training efforts to see how it effects your overall recovery and HR