Shoot....

Anyone that tells you to forget about a cadence moniter is crazy. When I first started doing hill climbs, my hills would average between 6 and 9 km/hr. I was horrified. Actually, I was closer to 6 km/hr. As I got better at it, I started climbing faster. I am still new at this hill game. I try to keep my hills no slower than 15.5 km/hr. As I continue to work with hill training, I really hope to get to 20+ km/hr. A bike computer wouldn't kill you, and it doesn't cost that much to begin with. No more expensive than the mid-range moniters, and in some cases, cheaper. Just my 2 cents with that one.

As far as HRM's are concerned, it is true. I think any old moniter will work, but if you want something with a backlight for your night riding or early morning riding, you'll have to shell out a couple of more bucks. I was happy with my hrm until I started riding at night and couldn't read it! I am no expert on HRM's, but check www.heartmoniters.com. They have most (if not all) of the legitimate hrm's on the market. They are very unbiased and just give the description of the watches and the prices. I bought a bunch of moniters from them in the past.

A word of caution. From my own experience, the Timex digital hrm's are horrifyingly bad. I am not down with that piece of junk. They're too hard to figure out, sometimes you can't read them unless you twist your arm around and bend your head back in some britney-spears, can't-dance movement. And they sometimes take a bit of time to start up. I have 10 of them I can't wait to get out of my office. They are in a box and I ain't touchin' them again!

As far as using them to increase endurance and speed, it's true you would need to know max hr in order to do achieve these objectives. You can do a sub-max test, which is not as strenuous as the max hr test. Or you can do the max hr test and go to a performance lab in the neighborhood, and they can determine what your max hr is and give you the recommendations on what heart rate ranges for you to work at using your hrm. I went to a performance lab at my club that was based out of San Diego, and I did the max hr test and got the readout and the recommendations on where to work my training schedule. I also know I'm due for a new test, and I'll be out there in Oct to have my next one performed. I just wouldn't trust anyone else. They are lifesavers. Find some way of doing a test to determine what numbers you want to work with on your hrm. That 220-age crap is as old as the driven snow. It just doesn't take into account genetics, fitness levels, or any other factors that may affect your heart rate.

Good luck.

Koffee Brown