Ultrasport Heart Rate Monitor with Chest Strap

Simple to setup and use, this heart rate monitor does exactly what it's supposed to. The instruction manual is clearly written and easy to follow. The chest strap fits well and is comfortable to wear; most importantly you can easily replace its battery (some of the more expensive brands require you to buy an entire new strap when the battery runs out, which is an absolutely ridiculous concept).

I was pleasantly surprised to find out that it's also compatible with gym equipment (at least with Technogym machines, anyway). I jumped on the treadmill and it picked up the signal from the chest strap straight away.

Why waste your money on anything else?

The one thing letting this feature-packed heart monitor down is its instruction booklet, which makes it hard to understand how to programme it for use.

The watch itself looks and feels good quality and reminds me a lot of an old Nike sports watch I once had. It tells the time and date and features a light, stopwatch and countdown timer. All off these are easy enough to navigate and use - its the main function that is a bit annoying.

The heart rate monitor does works and that too has some nifty features, like and optimum heart rate zone, which you can personalise to suit yourself. Work out your perfect zone for burning calories (this is easy enough to do using your age and a simple equation given to you in the instruction booklet) and you can enter it into the watch... This is where things get a bit tricky.

The instruction to do this are terrible; with things in an illogical order and ill thought out instructions. It makes it a real chore. However, keep at it and your will eventually get your head round it.

One you have your optimum heart rate zone entered, you can then set the watch up to beep when you exceed or drop below you ideal heart rate, thus ensuring an efficient workout.

It also tells you the percentage of your maximum workout rate too, so you'll know just how hard your pushing yourself. The chest strap works well, transmitting data to the watch, but it can start to slip down your chest a bit when you get sweaty and you're moving about.

Overtall, I'm happy with the device. It does what's asked of it, it's just it was about 5 or 6 workouts before I figured it all out... I think I've got it now, but I'm not 100% sure I'd be able to set it up again when the batteries run out, so I won't be throwing away the instructions - even though they are very poorly written.

There are a few things you will need to read in the instructions - for example how to set the date / time and access the different modes but once you've done that this is a very simple piece of kit.

The elastic strap goes horizontally across the solar plexis or breast bone I think, with the reader in the middle - not on the left.

Put it into heart mode, click again for it to start reading, and off you go. The strap is not uncomfortable to run in, but keep it reasonably tight to stay in place - especially if you are thin - not like me!

There are so many uses for this device. Firstly it shows how high your hear goes if you go out running from 'cold'. I went up to 210bpm, but once I was warmed up it went down, first to 180 then 160. Next time I'll take it more gently to start. It's also good to get you moving. When I rested between running spells, I used 110bpm to start running again.

Also you can take off the watch and attach it to your bike or device in the gym eg rowing. The watch is waterproof.