Polar CS100 Heart rate monitor is a fairly extensive cycle computer with cadence and heart rate monitor combined into one. For those who enjoy an extensive range of stats during and after a ride, this will be a tempting buy.
After a while of not using a heart rate monitor I asked Polar for a heart rate monitor loan so I could review this model and also get back into using a heart rate.
Firstly setting up should be relatively straightforward, though in my case it did require looking at a manual quite a few times (why does the iPad generation hate looking at manuals so much?). It took me about 15 minutes to get up and running. The magnet needs to be fairly close to the sensor and it didn’t seem to register very low speed when I was testing. But, I am notoriously incompetent at simple bike jobs.
It looks fine on the handlebars and gives a nice easy display. Polar products tend to be quite stylish it fits in with the rest of bike design.
The cadence measurer is really quite big, it’s a shame it can’t be a little smaller. I wouldn’t be too keen on the cadence option of this product, though optimising cadence can be an important part of cycling.
I was most interested in the heart rate feature. Like any heart rate monitor you need to wet the strap around your chest to get it started. However, once I had it going, it worked absolutely fine. There weren’t really any glitches with the heart rate monitoring.
By default the heart rate monitor is set to be on alarm when you are outside of your heart rate target zone. This soon got very irritating and I turned it off.
During the ride, it was interesting to be able to see speed, distance and heart rate all in the same place. The lap function is also useful if you are doing intervals and want to see speed and heart rate during different sections of the training.
Some report that in the wet, it stops working. This wasn’t my experience, perhaps it was early models that were more susceptible to rain.
Main Features
- Automatic/Manual target zone (% / bpm / HRR%)
- Heart rate (displayed as % of maximum heart rate)
- Wireless set up.
- Cadence
- Heart rate (displayed as bpm)
- Over-sized display
- Average heart rate
- Calorie expenditure – need to add weight, height into computer
- Speed Average, current and Max
- Distance (total)
- Exercise Time (total)
- Exercise file info page with date and time
- Number of exercise files (with summaries)
- Time in target zone
Overall Review
If you like a load of stats this will help give as much as you want relative to speed, cadence and heart rate. For the number of functions it’s reasonable value. However, if you’re a real stat merchant, you will probably be wanting to also get a power meter as that will be even more useful for training. But, that would take you to a whole new price bracket.
I had to send back HRM to Polar as it was just on loan for a few weeks, but I would have happily kept it and I would have continued to use it. I might try and test more.
Using a Heart Rate Monitor General
It was interesting to be training with heart rate monitor for a change. It’s good to see how you heart rate can vary on a section of an interval, it helps prevent losing concentration on certain parts of the ride. On recovery rides, it helps keep you from getting over excited.
- Polar CS100N Cycling Speed and Heart Rate Monitor
at Amazon around £80
- Polar CS 100 at Chain Reaction Cycles – £84.99
- Polar cs100 at Polar
- Best Wireless cycle computers
The Polar gear is very good – pity it is not Mac friendly (unless that has changed recently)