New owner of Suunto Race - first feelings

vlado

Here are some observations from my side, mainly in comparison with the previous watch which was Vertical:

GPS - as good as on Vertical
HR during run is better, no mora peaks where it goes to 200beats for no reason
Finaly option to clear all notifications
Better flashlight
Sleep tracking much better, really accurate
Scrolling much smoother
Steps count, more accurate, no steps while you are typing on pc, for example

These are just quick observations after three days use
Only thing that i dont like are these 22mm straps but those i will change for 24mm as i did on Vertical also

leafs93

@vlado how do you change from 22mm to 24mm strap? Isn’t the width fixed, and can only use 22mm strap ?

vlado

@leafs93 take the pins from 22mm, put it inside 24mm and with razor remove the extra silicone so that the strap can go inside, works perfect.

Stoke80

@vlado & @ChrisA

Does the screen never turn totally “black” when it is inactive?

I think that could be disturbing to some people in the night?

Highlands

@vlado After a week or so, could you please share how the battery holds up during activity and out of activity? Thank you.

martintrail

@Stoke80 No, you can set the screen to turn off completely. I have it set that way.

Stoke80

@martintrail said in New owner of Suunto Race - first feelings:

@Stoke80 No, you can set the screen to turn off completely. I have it set that way.

Is it a backlight setting? Or with dnt?

martintrail

@Highlands I charged to 100% on Sunday and today I have 67% battery, about 1 hour of activity every day. I wear them 24/7, always on display off, mobile notifications off… But we’ll see in time, it’s a new watch with a fresh battery.

Highlands

@martintrail So far, sounds pretty good. Cheers

martintrail

@Stoke80 Under display settings there is an option “always on”

ChrisA

@Stoke80 as @martintrail said: by setting the DND times it tunrs black in that time - completly black.

ChrisA

@vlado said in New owner of Suunto Race - first feelings:

Sleep tracking much better, really accurate

Looks good for me too (just one night albeit), compared to Ouraring same hand

Stoke80

@ChrisA said in New owner of Suunto Race - first feelings:

@Stoke80 as @martintrail said: by setting the DND times it tunrs black in that time - completly black.

Thank you for the explanation.

vlado

@ChrisA yesterday it also picked up a afternoon nap, looked pretty accurate

@vlado My life is marked by naps so good to know

ChrisA

@vlado oh, thats cool - did not know this was already implemented

ChrisA

First run done - wrist HR seems accurate for me, but I never had major issues with wrist HR. GPS is very good, but I would say, that the Vertical‘s GPS is a bit more accurate, but will need more tracks to see if thats true.
Display outdoors is great - although you can’t have white backgrounds on the AMOLED display.

Egika

@helgonet12 said in New owner of Suunto Race - first feelings:

@ChrisA do you think it is to bright in the evening? Or is it possible to adjust it so it is not to much at evening/ nights?

There is an ambient light sensor built in, that adjusts the brightness. So in the evening it will be dimmed down more. The low, medium and high settings in the watch just set the base, from where it will then adjust,

helgonet12

@Egika thanks, that is great news. A friend has epix2 pro and it is just to bright at evenings and night for my taste. If I recall correctly Epix2 do not have ambient sensor.

pneves · Suunto Race owner since 24/10/2023

Received mine yesterday, steel version. I really like the look of the same color around all the watch instead of two tone. Moreover I saved 100 euro

Delivery was very fast with order on 22 afternoon (Sunday) and received 24 at 12h through DHL here in Portugal.

My first considerations. Previously I had a Garmin Enduro for some months that I really liked, but Garmin Edge computer drove me nuts with the sensor disconnection fiasco. Changed to a used Wahoo Roam v1 and really appreciate the screen legibility and reliability of connections and operation. I don’t run (I would love to love running but I hate it), sometimes a walk and really like to have notifications on my wrist. Tried also to live with an AW series 7 in 2021 and gave up after 3 days and 3 charging events. its a watch, not a phone that is easy to plug in! A watch one has to take it off and put it on…
So the garmin had to go since even with RunGap sending the cycling activities the Garmin metrics were not updating. I searched for a proper replacement and found none that could take into account activities done on other devices, except Fitbit. Took the plunge on a Versa 4 and it was a nightmare, it counts steps while cycling even after the exported activity. The screen is very small and fonts very difficult to read for my 48 yo eyes. Had to return it.

After some more research I came to Suunto. Previously I have used polar (V800) with satisfactory results so I was also on the eye for them. The V3 seemed compelling but was more expensive and the Gorilla Glass vs Sapphire made me jump on the Race, the first ever Suunto I have.

Well, end of history facts. So what about my take on this wearable?

The pros:

design and materials feel more premium than the Enduro, specially the screen and strap. yes, the fact that the strap end is secured with a pin instead of square easy to brake rubber strap rings take it to a whole new usability friendless for me
the screen is big, text is easy to read, slightly bigger than the Enduro
the app is very good, much better than GC
The maps are nice
The notification interaction is very good, if I want I can just read after without clearing, or just clear this one or all
The vibration is very strong and incoming calls vibrate as long as the call is getting through, something I hated the Enduro was not doing (only vibrated once)
The AoD display is simple, although I would like to see status icons on it
Fast operation, the Enduro lagged too much for my taste, this one is FAST!
The Digital Crown is superb! moreover it used the natural scrolling idea as the Mac does, so kudos for that also
The phone connection is very stable, but so was generally the Garmin (the fitbit was bad in this regard)
the step counter is conservative, something I prefer to the opposite. Garmin counted 500 steps while showering, fitbit was much worse
the time the GPS takes to get a lock
does not take system resources trying to guess if you are in activity, something that in my experience is useless on most platforms (Garmin, AW or fitbit)
battery life so far

The cons (some I believe come form the watch being new and still needs further development):

very limited watch faces (ok with that), not being able to select individual the complications (more severe). for instance I am using the analog watchface that has 4 complications, 3 of them are fixed (date is good, steps is good, activity time is useless for me) and the final one can toggle between battery (super fine) and altitude (no interest for me whatsoever)
selection of the time the screen stays on. Sometimes it stays a minute, sometimes it just goes into AoD mode after a few seconds. Would like to control this. Also selection of time on DnD mode so that I can use the flashlight to go to a nature break at night and after using it the display goes immediately blank, don’t want to disturb my roommate
no status icons on the watch face for bluetooth phone connection and missed notifications, something I was used to on the Enduro and loved
possibility to automatically expand information (access the widgets) from the watch face with long press, e. g. when I press the steps counter
could not find any information about floors climbed, although the watch has barometric altimeter (could someone help here?)
the widget pin can be accessed though swipe left and central button press. A missed opportunity for a shortcut. Moreover, the swipe right does nothing
double tap or palm touch do nothing. Expected double tap to wake up without gesture and palm to immediately switch off the screen (something I loved on the fitbit)
possibility to select the fields and number of fields per page on an activity, something I really liked on the Garmin. However, I must say that Suunto thought this well, for instance Yoga has almost everything I would like to see (except breathing rate)
possibility to download maps without connecting to a charger!
app with dark mode (nitpicking here)
the minimum level of display brightness is very high (just turning on the display seems like a flashlight on complete darkness)
music on the watch (I don’t use but some of my friends love to run without a phone)
the interface sometimes uses a solid color over all the display without any need, e. g. when a notification is cleared. It stresses the screen without any need and impacts battery life. An image like a big check on black background can make the same effect while being more efficient in terms of resources

The tests I haven’t done:

using the watch while cycling and checking the steps it counts. if it counts steps clearing them when a cycling activity is imported
Use the GPS to track a walk
real battery life with normal use (so far I have been stressing it with all the interactions and lost 25% on a day)

Ideas for hardware on future products:

wireless charging instead of pin contact
wrist calls

So far happy with the purchase and excited with the direction Suunto is going.