Fitbit Ionic Heat Rate Zone Alerts?

[jaserunner]

Hello!  I wanted to know if the new Fitbit Ionic will send an alert (vibration or other) when the different heart rate zones are entered/exited? 

[bcalvanese]

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@bbarrera wrote:

Yes it would be a nice feature, there are times that I want to be alerted. Like a couple of months ago on a club ride on a very hot July day when I wasn't paying attention to HR, hit a wall, and then after finishing the ride immediately received an email that I set a new HR threshold (20-min) value. Felt horrible that evening.

Heart rate monitoring while running/cycling does provide valuable information about aerobic fitness, however HR should be treated as a secondary metric to pace (running) or power (cycling). For the runners out there I think this is a nicely balanced article:

http://running.competitor.com/2014/06/training/is-heart-rate-monitoring-worth-the-bother_7095

Heart rate monitoring is not the same as heart rate training. My HRM keeps me honest and reminds me to back off when I'm suppose to do an easy active recovery ride, as I'm usually tempted to push harder. And I get valuable information about my aerobic fitness level (trending power-to-HR ratio info to track performance increases and aerobic decoupling). 

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I think the opposite. I think pace should be secondary. Just because someone with longer & stronger legs than me can run at a faster pace with less effort, does not mean his/her heart and lungs are necessarily in better shape than mine. There are too many variables involved in the pace theory. The heart and lungs are the best way to determine fitness level in my opinion because there are only 2 variables. Heart rate and breathing.

If you get your true max heart rate, and do heart rate training properly, your pace will improve over time, but to say that you should be able to run x distance in x amount of time to determine if you are at a good cardio fitness level just doesn't make sense.

What makes more sense to me is being able to keep your heart and lungs at x level for x amount of time. It don't matter how fast you can go. What does matter is that you are huffing and puffing and sweating for at least a half hour non stop, and training effect does not start kicking in for about 20 minutes, so to get a real good training effect you need an hour of huffing and puffing and sweating.

[bbarrera]

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bcalvanese wrote: 

I think the opposite. I think pace should be secondary. Just because someone with longer & stronger legs than me can run at a faster pace with less effort,

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to say that you should be able to run x distance in x amount of time to determine if you are at a good cardio fitness level just doesn't make sense.

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@bcalvanese Think you misunderstood me, as I didn't say anything about benchmarking your pace against others. And you are responding to separate topics, fitness for running/cycling, and overall cardio fitness. 

Someones fitness level for running/cycling is better measured by trending pace/power over time, and thats why I said its the primary metric. Your bodies response to running, cycling, and other endurance sports is somewhat complex, it is not just your aerobic system. And heart rate can be rather variable at times, due to heat or hydration or fatigue or stress. 

Said another way, when I'm in good shape I can put down a strong effort on 5k run or 10 mile time trial, for *me* that would be 270 watts cycling or 9 minutes/mile running (resulting in roughly 27 minute finishing times). In 70-80 degree weather that pace/power is possible to sustain at a reasonable HR. But when the temps jump to 85-95 my HR shoots up +10bpm and I can't sustain the effort as long and my power/pace drops. In fact for a 10 mile time trial my power at 90 degrees drops to 250ish watts. Despite higher HR my fitness level hasn't changed - I can still put down the same effort - but not as long because my circulatory system is forced to increase blood flow (thereby increasing HR) near the skin for evaporative cooling. 

I agree with you about improving overall cardio fitness level by engaging in moderate to vigorous aerobic activities for 30 minutes or more - its what the government recommends based on heath studies.

[Jim2xG]

Hi,

I have also missed this feature when I bought my first Fitbit which was Versa. But I was so happy to discover that you can develop your own apps. So I did just that, I have created an app called Vibrating HR Zone Tracker. It tracks HR changes and if your HR crosses the threshold of your custom zone you are informed by vibrations and changing screen color of the watch. There's a different vibration pattern for each zone (lower, target, higher), so it will be easy for you to recognize which threshold you have passed even without looking at your watch. But visual cues are also added for convenience - screen is blue if HR is in lower zone, red if in higher and black with green borders if in target.

You should be able to install it to your Versa or Ionic through this link or search for it in Fitbit app gallery.

https://gam.fitbit.com/gallery/app/1a69c1fc-c63f-414d-98ef-2222eb8583b1

[bbarrera]

@Jim2xG thanks for the update and app. The problem with 3rd Fitbit apps is they can't run at the same time you are using Ionic/Versa in exercise mode to track a run/hike/bike workout.

[Jim2xG]

In theory if you're running Fitbit should auto detect your run, even while
using 3rd party app though I've not tested this yet as I am mostly using it
for my HIIT workouts. But still you would be missing pace, distance, etc.
Which is not perfect, as is this watch. Only thing keeping me from changing
to Apple Watch is battery life and sleep tracking. But for fitness tracking
it's far from perfect.

[AlphaState]

Your app modify values from 5 to 5 BPM. Can you modify it for 1 BPM change? I want to exercise 80/20 technique and my zone is 123-133BPM and I cannot introduce these values in your app.