I’m in the hunt for a new watch that will track my prone sessions, including the linkage of waves.
What watches are people using as well as apps that you’re finding are the most accurate. At the moment I’m leaning towards a Garmin but can be pursued otherwise.
Cheers
Apple Watch Ultra with Dawn Patrol app also linked into my surfline subscription for replays of waves.
Having cell reception on the phone is a nice safety buffer out there as well
I’m not part of the Apple ecosystem, so I just use a Garmin Instinct I bought used off Facebook with the Garmin Connect App. I actually have to press start and stop at the beginning of every wave. A little bit of a pain, but it’s second nature now and I never miss a wave. Would not be great for regular surfing, but since foil rides are so much longer it really doesn’t bother me. I’ve looked at upgrading to the Instinct 2 Solar Surf version so I wouldn’t have to press start and stop every wave, but reviews seem to be mixed and my method works well. Love looking back at my tracks, speed, and heart rate.
I’ve used the Garmin Instinct but it bombed out after 13 months. The cost to repair was not worth it.
I opted for a cheeper watch. I’ve had the Amazfit T-Rex Pro for 2 years and no problems. Loads of features. Long lasting battery. Seems to be accurate tracking every wave and speed. User friendly. It has its own app that has alot of details.
Garmin Fenix 7 sapphire solar (with dual-band GPS) and the Surf Tracker 2 app.
Classifies each wave perfectly and then tells me how long I was on foil when the wave is over.
Sucks how expensive the watch is but there are plenty on eBay now. The dual band gps makes a huge difference in the surf which is why I got this model. I had a Garmin instinct but returned it because the wave tracking was bad.
I use the same set-up for dock starting to measure how long I’ve been pumping.
My iPhone in a waterproof bag stuffed inside my wetsuit. Dawn Patrol or Waterspeed app.
Do you have any images of what the surf tracker app looks like with your waves recorded? Interested to compare it between that and dawn patrol.
It’s a 3rd party app and displays your wave info during the session.
The stats at the end are just a table but this happens in addition to the default Garmin surf tracking so you don’t give up all those gps tracks and surfline sessions and automatic Strava uploads etc etc etc
This was my method until one random harmless crash onto my chest was enough to crack the screen in half.
Thanks mate. Does it show a map of your waves caught like the dawn patrol app does?
I was fairly anti Apple & moved from Android to iOS just to get the dawn patrol app on the iwatch & have not regretted doing so at all.
Was previously using a Garmin watch & surf tracker 2.
What do you reckon between the two now? Do you find it accurate enough on the Iwatch? Also did you get an ultra or settle for one of the series? I’m on a rock in a hard place at the moment.
Imo, the iwatch is far superior to my old Garmin - I have the series 8 but if I had my time again would go for the Ultra mainly for the better battery.
hah yeah I’m the same as above, was quite anti apple, had all pc’s, google pixel phones, garmin watches (using surf tracker2)
then they released the apple watch ultra and got my attention, but of course you then get sucked into the “ecosystem” so next minute my bank account is much lighter but I’m now on the watch ultra, iphone, macbook, airpods bandwagon.
The watch and dawn patrol is hugely more functional than my previous garmin in all categories except battery life (I’d get a week out of the garmin)
What about the series 9 over the ultra though? I know it doesn’t have dual freq gps but is it still suffice would you think considering the price difference?
Yes but you can’t see the map during your session.
Also the tracks are from the default surf app, not Surf Tracker 2 which is more accurate .
To be completely honest in my opinion the only thing that matters for surfing is dual band GPS. it sucks that American companies charge so much for it. CoreOS devices offer that same chip on watches that cost hundreds of dollars less
Get the Ultra I watch if you can, friend has it and is very happy. I had the 7 and it started giving me trouble within 8 months and now the system is completely corrupted and not worth fixing. Waste of money. Looked at Garmin but will wait till I can afford the Ultra
I use the Garmin Fenix 7. It lasted 1 year and 2 months before one of the buttons started acting up. I was foiling with it 5 days a week. It was two months past the warranty, but Garmin replaced it with a brand new Fenix 7 (not a refurb). The button died because I started foiling at a spot without a shower and I had gotten away from giving it a regular fresh water rinse.
I was open to possibly replacing the Garmin with the Apple Ultra, but guys I talked to in the water about their Apple watch complained about the screen locking up when wet and no real time data during the foil session. The Apple watch users also told me they could not see the map during the surf session.
With the Garmin Fenix 7 and Surf Tracker 2, I get my wave stats after every wave. My previous Garmin Fenix 5 lasted for 5 years, but the wave data was not accurate. To get accurate ride length, I would have to manually look at the GPS data. The Fenix 7 with the multi band GPS is probably 90% accurate on wave data.
With the Garmin, I can see the map during the surf session. I can drop pins at take off spots. Some spots like G-Land, it is extremely difficult locate the take off spot when all the land marks look the same.
The Garmin Surf app gives nice tracks but doesn’t give real time data and I can’t use the lap timer to time sets. With the Surf Tracker 2 app, I get real time data and the lap timer so I use the Surf Tracker 2 app and make do without the graphical surf tracks.
Also, with Garmin all the GPS data can be downloaded for further analysis. Can you download the GPS data from the Apple watch?
