This post is sponsored by Epson, but all opinions are mine.

 

I really love toys.

I mean, I’m 34 going on 4, so this makes sense. But I love trying out gear, so I was fascinated when I heard Epson was launching a running watch, I was intrigued. Epson…like, the printer? Are they 3D printed watches? (As it turns out, Epson is owned by the same company that owns Seiko.)

To be honest, for the past few years, I’ve mostly relied on my Apple Watch for my running. I haven’t been training for any time goal, so just knowing the overall distance and pace has been all I needed.

But as I attempt to channel my grief and the strength I’ve gained in this past year into running hard and fast (and often!), I need something a bit more than that super-simple interface.

Already, I have two half-marathons on my calendar: the NYC Half and the DC Women’s Half. (My old boss/friend/mentor Morgan is running that one and it took her approximately two seconds of arm-twisting to get me to agree to this one.) I’m also in for the Franklin Lakes Triathlon again, I think. It was just weeks before my mom died and I deferred it last year because I was so sad that she wouldn’t be able to come out to watch. If I find that one is too emotional to do…I do still *really* want to do at least another triathlon in 2018.

So, I need a watch that can stand up to my training needs and accommodate both speed workouts and multisport. I love that technology has progressed far enough that my watch can transmit my run data to my phone via Bluetooth (anyone remember the old ANT+ devices? I lost the ANT+ 94% of the time), but my honest opinion is that the transmission is still a bit slow, and the UI to create your account in the Epson View app is sort of clunky (not a huge fan of having to go back to my email to sign up, I’ll take a Google or FB sign-on any day).

Apparently I’ve been running for a while now, because I also remember back in my old days of running, wearing one of those terrible chest straps if I wanted any sort of heart rate data. I love that this watch also has a wrist heart monitor.

Since this post has just turned into Theodora realizing she’s old — another thing I love is that it also tracks steps. Remember when you wore a separate activity tracker from your running watch? The future is here, people.

And if you buy from the Epson e-store between now and Christmas, you’ll still get the awesome $30 off deal they’ve been running PLUS free two day shipping with code BLANCHFIELD17.

What’s your running watch of choice lately?