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Ordered my first smar****ch, a Garmin instinct 2x. I won’t actually receive it for a month due to a protracted overseas purchase process and my need for a bargain.
Reviews say it’s got good training readiness analysis, but I’m curious to know if the sleep tracking will be more than a curiosity/confirmation that my sleep is poor quality.
Smar****ch users do you find sleep tracking useful?
Try taking vitamin d in the evening, with fat as it’s fat soluble, if your quality of sleep is poor.
It's told me that my kids woke me up in the middle of the night.
I ignore it.
If you're awake worrying but not moving, it thinks you're asleep. It's not in any way sophisticated.
So it should track my sleep dancing at least
If you’re awake worrying but not moving, it thinks you’re asleep. It’s not in any way sophisticated.
Not sure about that, mine (an Instinct 2) certainly detects this. It's a bit more sophisticated than just a movement sensor.
What I've learned from following the data over time:
* Ideally avoid any alcohol, but if you do drink try to minimise the amount you have before bed.
* High intensity exercise late at night isn't good, either
* The sleep data feeds into Garmin's body battery score (and presumably training readiness, although my watch doesn't have that metric). This is a pretty accurate (and unbiased) assessment of how I feel on a day, and you can definitely use it to decide if you're going to do a hard workout today or tomorrow.
That said, the individual night's data is pretty useless. I generally know if I've slept well or not. I don't need a watch to tell me.
This guy does a lot of smar****ch sleep etc tests,including instinct - garmin sleep review
Although i got the new fitbit inspire 2 based on these,and a lot of days it has failed to collect data, or 3hours sleep is not enough data to process, and i feel that a lot of hours ive been lying in bed thinking but it counts it as sleep.
Also you need a subscription for the pro level results, which dont seem to tell me much i didnt know already
The instinct uses heart rate and heart rate variability as inputs to its sleep tracking alongside movement, and that seems to be what a few others like Polar and Whoop also use to give you a sleep and recovery rating.
I've been using sleep tracking on a Polar for the last 2 years, and it is useful to see trends that lead to good sleep and recovery, or indeed poor sleep and recovery, and see recommended next day exercise intensity.
Similar to Mogrim, big mileage days and alcohol lead to poor sleep. For me eating red meat in the evening is also not great.
While some of that is probably a bit of a no-brainer, actually seeing the scoring in the morning and looking at the difference in heart rate variability on good and bad nights has prompted me to make some lifestyle changes.
I really like the Polar sleep tracking stuff, been using it for several years. Although its really just FYI really as you can't exactly go back in time and do anything about it....
Always feel good if it scores my sleep highly though, like getting an A in an exam...
What I have found to be the best single metric of recovery state is the lowest recorded HR over night, which normally occurs just before I wake up. It's often quite a few bpm lower than the average over night, but as a general rule, the lower that is, the more recovered I am.
For me, 45 is recovered. The morning after a long ride, I'm still pretty tired and the HR shows it:
[url= https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52910347968_c96b49934d_c.jp g" target="_blank">https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52910347968_c96b49934d_c.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/2oBvn5L ]Polar HR[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/brf/ ]Ben Freeman[/url], on Flickr