Scosche Rhythm 24

I’ve had problems with HR monitors of late.  I train by HR zone so having a semi accurate and reliable montior is kind of important to me.

I started with a Garmin HR Chest Strap, the basic one everyone probably starts with.  It was good until the strap wore out.  How it wears out is beyond me but about 4 months it started reading erratically.  I tried changing batteries to no avail and then found posts that indicate the straps should be considered consumable and the Polar straps lasted longer.

This was around month 5 of my running and right in time for Black Friday sales so I bought a Polar replacement strap for $10.   Worked great.  Until it didn’t work so great and it was time to buy another one.

Now at $10 to $20 a pop and 4-6 months of life that was a bit ridiculous so I bought a Scosche Rhythm+.

Well on me it didn’t work so good.  Lots of drop outs in signal and it would consistently read ridiculously high in the first 5 to 10 minutes.  Like 20 beats above my max HR when I was just warming up.   I went so far as to take it off once and it still kept on reading something at 180 beats a minute.

So I went back to the Garmin which was at least somewhat more reliable.

It was with interest that I read about the Scosche Rhythm 24 and the new updated sensors and the new algorithms and all that.

And I couldn’t not buy one as my current chest strap was once again failing.  So another $20 for a new strap or try something else.

I did a short 30 minute run today, last teaser run before our marathon in a couple of days.   The Scosche Rhythm 24 I’m happy say paired easily and quickly to my Fenix 5.   During the run the HR seemed to be most responsive and more ‘real time’ if that’s a thing.   And most importantly during the run at no point did I see any stupidity or silliness with the numbers.

After the run when I checked the data it was a beautiful chart.   A start at 50 beats a minute ramping up to 118 over the next quarter mile or so and then leveling out around 120 beats a minute for the remaining 3 miles with only minor variations which were attributable by changes in pacing.

There were zero drops in the data and no ridiculous ramps up to 180 and then dropping down to 120 in the space of 10 seconds. It was a smooth climb to my cruising HR and then steady as she goes Cap’n till the end of the run.

Now this was a single run of a fairly short distance but I have to say I’m pretty happy with it so far.

In full disclosure a LOT of the new features that aren’t just about HR aren’t avaialble to me because I don’t own a iPhone, I’m Android.  But I don’t really care about those features, they’ll be nice to haves once they do produce a android app (assuming they do, they never really released a working one for the Rhythm+, just one that would brick your Rhythm by not checking if the firmware needed updating before trying to push it).

So if the new features are important to you and you don’t own an iPhone this may not be the HR device for you.

But if you want what appears, knock wood, to be a good way to get accurate valid HR data, albeit at a price, then you may want to consider it.   If nothing else it’s more comfortable than a HR chest belt and there’s no strap to wear out.