watch advice

[MarmaladeJane]

Has anyone used an Apple Watch series 8 watch for marathon training? I currently have a series 3 which is 5 years old and I am considering upgrading. My series 3 has been great so far but as I get into the longer runs I don’t think the battery will last long enough. Also I would like to take advantage of the heart rate training zone function, this only works with the latest software upgrade but that is not compatible with series 3.

[beth_f 10 Miles]

Hello @MarmaladeJane - I'm not a marathon runner (unlikely to be either) but I have a Series 7.

Battery life is good (much better than the earlier watches) and can be charged up in under an hour, not that I've needed to as it still has around 50/60% before taking it off for bed.

I'm redoing C25K after injury and have been able to programme in C25K on my watch through the custom function on workouts. Gives you lots of stats - heart rate / hr zones / pace etc.

Just give me a shout if you need any more info 😊

[linda9389 Administrator Marathon]

I'm aftaid I'm an applephobe so can't help, but am sure others will be able to 😊

[nowster Metric Marathon]

There are smart watches and running watches.

Apple makes smart watches. They can be used as running watches (with the right apps) but they're not really optimised for long run sessions.

I believe the more recent Apple watches will last the 4-6 hours of a typical marathon, but it might be tight if you're on the slower side. Turning off a lot of its features will help with battery life.

A typical entry-level running-specific watch will last at least 16 hours when recording a running activity, and usually over a week in watch mode.

It all depends on how wedded you are to the Apple ecosystem.

(I needed to upgrade from a Garmin vivoactive 3 as my sessions were starting to go over 3 hours and its battery was almost flat at the end of the run.)

[MarmaladeJane Half Marathon]

I got the Apple Watch in the end. Still not sure how long the battery will last but I will try it on my long run this weekend. 🤞

[Tasha99 Marathon]

I found my Apple Watch to be very inaccurate so I swapped to a garmin

[MarmaladeJane Half Marathon in reply to Tasha99]

I bought the Apple 8 in the end and so far mine is working well. I also use the Run Trainer app which tracks distance and pace and although not 100% the numbers are very close. I think it will be fine for me at least for now. Maybe if I was a bit more focussed on hitting a specific pace and time then it could be an issue. For now I am just enjoying running after many years. Marathon training is currently all on plan so far. Just under 10 weeks to go!