Bryton Cardio 60 Review - Part one: Unboxing

Finally after a couple of false starts trying to purchase a Garmin 310xt that left me £150 down for a fortnight (Gee thanks Amazon) and one returned order I have settled on the Bryton Cardio 60 GPS Multisport watch. There were several reasons for the choice. In an ideal world I fancied the Suunto Ambit 2 or the Garmin Ambit2. I also wanted a bike GPS, wetsuit, new wheels... etc... you get the picture.

Deciding factors were:

1. Rutland cycles had the unit with the HRM on sale for £119 (about half the RRP)
2. DC Rainmaker had an OK and fairly in depth review
3. It looks ok
4. Vibrating alerts for laps/targets/time etc
5. Multisport

So I picked it up from the post office on Green Lanes which was an experience in itself as I was the only person in their not conducting a week's worth of business at 9 in the morning. Hard though it was I made myself wait until I got home to take it out and have a play.

The box itself isn't as classy as the TomTom and a little less pro looking than the Garmin boxes.

In the box is the unit, a USB charger, HRM and strap, 2 instruction booklets (One with 12 pages of English instructions) and three copies of the warranty.

The Bryton Cardio 60 (With printed screen protector still on)

HRM and strap

USB Charging clip

Wrist shot (I have relatively large wrists)

The unit is surprisingly light and a little flimsy feeling. I am not massively concerned although the waterproof rating is only 30m. It is comfy on the wrist, does not feel particularly big, and the strap locks quite nicely to the strap loop.

I had already signed up for a Brytonsport.com account so I just needed to download the agent and update the software on the watch.

The site is pretty basic, but it appears to be ideal for an amateur like me. I'm going to customise the screens after using it a few times and see how it goes.

***Update***

I tested it this morning on a gentle run and uploaded the info to the bryton site. The info is easier to read and analyse than it had been using the Runmeter app. It also appears to be more accurate (I'll need to test consistency) compared to googlemaps. When I mapped out a route on googlemaps then ran it on runmeter I'd frequently come up a lot shorter than the plan would suggest. I came in at 5.95km on a suggested 6km route but I started recording after I'd crossed the road, so I probably lost 20m. Not too shabby so far.

A main motivator for getting something like this for a race as complex (technically) as a triathlon is that I need to be training to complete each section as fresh as possible, which requires me to monitor my heart rate and pace. Difficult without kit.I entered my current times into a calculator online (at running free) and it reckoned I'd be all done in 03:09:55. Well we'll see.

Distance	Swim	T1	Bike	T2	Run	Total Time
SuperSprint 400/10/2.5	7:30	3:00	20:17	5:00	15:06	50:53
Sprint 750/20/5	14:20	3:00	42:00	5:00	31:30	1:35:50
Olympic 1500/40/10	29:17	3:00	1:26:57	5:00	1:05:40	3:09:55
O2 2000/80/20	59:48	3:00	3:00:03	5:00	2:16:55	6:24:47
Half IM 1900/90/HM	37:21	3:00	3:23:45	5:00	2:24:55	6:34:02
O3 4000/120/30	1:20:25	3:00	4:35:37	5:00	3:30:27	9:34:29
IM - Expert 3800/180/FM	1:16:17	3:00	7:01:53	5:00	5:02:07	13:28:18
IM - Beginner 3800/180/FM	1:16:17	3:00	7:22:59	5:00	6:02:32	14:49:49