I wanted to write a full review of SportTracks 2.0

but it's prooving more difficult than I thought it would be.

It's not that the program is hard to use. Just download it, run the installer, and run the program. Where it shines, is in interfacing with a compatible gps unit. Just plug your unit into the computer, click on import, and it brings the gps tracks in. (Hence the name sportsTRACKS.)

Of course I'm using the unit with a Garmin Edge, with heart rate and cadence. So besides the gps track, it keeps track of my heart rate and cadence, throughout the ride. And SportTracks gathers this data and allows you to do some cool things.

In the main "daily activity" view, you get a summary of the ride and the "track" overlaid on a Google map, satalite image or USGS elevation map. From there, you can change the "Summary" view to many different views. One of these is the "Splits" view.

This view will show laps and or splits recorded on the unit, or use custom splits of specified distances. The image shows 5 mile splits. For running I might use 1/4 mile splits.

In most of these views you can see the data recorded, but you can also view a graph of the data. The graphs can be customised to show what you want and where. In the example above (click the thumbnail to see it big) you can see for each split, that average power (I'll get into this power deal later) is shown as bars. Laid on top of that is a line for average heartrate (% of max) and speed.

The "speed" view is of more use to runners than cyclists, as your speed can vary greatly depending on intensity and terrain. But here's a shot anyway.

It's interesting, but I don't spend much time in this view.

I do however look at the "workout" view alot. In fact since I use my Edge as a heart rate monitor for indoor rides (turn the gps function off in the settings), I am still able to analize my workouts.

As with other views you can choose what you want displayed on the graph.

SportTracks has an added customisation benefit of plug-ins. A plug in is piece of additional software code you can download and install in the plug ins folder that can give you some interesting things to look at. One is the GPS2power plug in. It only works on pavement rides as it is really, just estimating the power output by reviewing your weight (along with your bike), elevation gain, wind speed, temprature and position/bike-rider profile. Off pavement, there's no way know how much power is lost in traction loss, so it makes no sense to get the powertrack on gravel rides.

Now there are other plug-ins available too. Accumilated summarys, similar routes, and high score are interesting ones I've been using. I may get into thier functions later.

SportTracks also allows you to keep track of your equipment. So you can know what you rode on which ride (if you have multiple bikes), or what shoes used for what run (if you have multiple shoes). Because it keeps track of the mileage, you can replace things before they break (hopefully).

There's an athlete's page that allows you to keep track of your info to see trends in health. included are fields for weight, BMI, resting heart rate, max heart rate, blood pressure, body fat, sleep, mood, and some others. You can also view much of this in graphs too, making it easier to see trends and know if you need to change your plan.

Now that I've told you about the features of the program, let me tell you my opinion of it. It's pretty cool. However it needs the gps unit to really work well. It's not so great on data that's just entered in. I'd recommend Cyclistats for that. In fact Cyclistats has some graphs and accumlition that I like better. Plus the ability to set up goals in Cyclistats is a feature missing from SportTracks. Though there is talk that a plug-in will be available soon that adds something like this.

SportTracks is free to download and try. They ask that if you like it, you donate some money to them. How cool is that? This gives you the option to pay what you think the software is worth, not what the developer thinks he's worth. It's a cool concept.

So I really think that if you have a compatible gps unit, you download and useSportTracks. It's really turning out to be a great program to anaylize your workouts and training. It's so much better than Garmin's Training Center (though you still need it to create and upload workouts for the unit) and/or the Motionbased web service they offer.

Tuesday 02/05/2008 | 05:55 pm

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I wanted to write a full review of SportTracks 2.0

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