The concept of bringing technology to every athletic wrist was pioneered by Timex and Casio a quarter century ago; and they probably got their inspiration from how there is not one person out there who doesn't secretly wish to role play James Bond at least sometimes. If you think about it, the "feature-watch" turned out to be a pretty successful watchmaking concept in its time; to people growing up 20 years ago, it was what the iPhone is to people today. While pointing to the desire people have to kind of look like the Terminator (at least at the wrist) is a good take on the evolution of high-tech sports watches, more often than not, runners are athletes who are way too serious at their sport to ever look at a piece of gear for any reason other than how well it enables their sport - surfers will want to know about the time of the tide, mountain climbers and trekkers about the positions of celestial bodies, and swimmers want to count their swimming laps. Let's look at the best sports watches you could get at the best athletic gear retailers around the country. They do all this and occasionally, also give you the time.
Did you read about how Jennifer Lopez completed the punishing Nautica Malibu Triathlon with a great time (2:23) not long ago? She raised more than $100,000 for a children's hospital with her achievement too. For athletes who share her enthusiasm for the triathlon, and would also like to stay alive through the terrible excesses of the competition comes the Timex Ironman Triathlon Heart Rate Monitor. For $90, it will help you keep your heart rate under control while you go be Superman.
To every power walker out there who counts each step, pedometers are as indispensable as they are annoying. The beeping gets to them, and they are just too cumbersome. The Tech4O Accelerator Fitness then, swoops in to do everything your pedometer is supposed to do - count the calories burned, the steps taken, the miles run - and also tell you the time; and best of all it does this with the least fuss possible
For some athletes, there is functional, and then there is functional. The Casios and the Timexes do their job very well, and they do it in their inimitable cheap and cheerful style. What about the seriously rich athlete who can't be seen with anything that costs two figures? For the Porsche and BMW set waits the $750 Tissot. It looks completely like any cool mechanical sports watches you might have seen by Rolex - with a on the graduated ring around the dial; look closer though, and a watch glass is a touchscreen. At a touch, it turns into a thermometer, a barometer, an altimeter, a compass and perhaps your best friend. It's Tissot T-Touch Polished Titanium.
Here's a watch that functionally goes even farther than the Tissot - the Garmin Forerunner 305 GPS Receiver With Heart Rate Monitor. Yes, it's a GPS receiver that's shaped like a sports watch. For something this small, the GPS accuracy is sensational; and you can take it into the water. It comes with Training Center software and everything you do can be analyzed with Motion Based. It's pretty cheap at $145, but I would place it above the Tissot in any review of sports watches.