Feature request: improved support for Stryd pod and other foot pods

[sloppysloper]

I have owned a Suunto Run watch since it came out, and recently bought myself a Stryd 5.0 foot pod.

I have configured the Stryd app to sync the workouts recorded by my watch via the Suunto API to the Stryd app.

After trying out my Stryd pod during a few intial runs and after reading the documentation that Stryd provides, I have relealized that Suunto only offers very basic/partial support for the metrics available in Stryd.

It seems like the competitors Coros and Garmin offer a better support for the Stryd pod, with Coros supporting all the metrics from Stryd by default, and even drawing graphical charts from those metrics in the Coros app.

I will try my best to describe what the current support is based based on my initial testing, and what I feel that could be improved. I’m a new Stryd user, so there might be some mistakes in some of the things that I mention here. Feel free to correct me!

Treadmill running

When NOT using a foot pod and running on the treadmill while recording the workout using Suunto Run, the watch is able to display basic things like Heart Rate, Distance, and ZoneSense if a HR belt is used. I did not see any data screen available that would display the current Pace.

When I connect my Stryd as a foot pod in the settings, there were two additional data screens available during the treadmill workout: one screen that showed Power and Cadence, and another screen that showed Ground Contact Time, Vertical Oscillation, and Ground Contact Balance. After adding the foot pod there was no Pace data available during the run.

What I find weird is that it seems that the Pace and Distance come from the watch instead of the foot pod when running on a treadmill. This can quite easily be seen when looking at the paces for the splits after the finishing the run.

The splits have different paces even though I was running a constant speed on the treadmill. I also verified this by holding my hand still during 5-6min mark and 20-21min mark while continuing to run the same speed.

If the Stryd pace would have been used, then there would not have been these drops in the Pace:

When I do an offline sync for the Stryd pod data in the Stryd app after the run, I can compare the metrics for the treadmill workout in the Suunto app and the Stryd app.

It looks like at least Power and possibly Cadence data come from the foot pod, but metrics like Ground Contact Time and Vertical Oscillation show different values in the Stryd app, which makes sense since Suunto uses those metrics from the watch instead of the foot pod.

Outdoor running

I’m not sure if there is any difference in the metrics record from the Stryd pod compared to a treadmill run when doing an outdoor run.

Like when doing a treadmill run, it does not seem to me that the Pace or Distance come from the Stryd pod, but at least are more accurate when GPS is used.

The Power metrics seem to be coming from the Stryd pod just like on a treadmill.

Problems with the Stryd app integration

According to Stryd documentation, Suunto does not support reading Elevation, Leg Spring Stiffness, Vertical Oscillation, Form Power, Ground Contact Time, or Air Power from the Stryd pod. These metrics need to be separately synced from the foot pod after the workout has been synced from Suunto to Stryd.

This is quite a poor user experience, and performing an offline sync from the Stryd pod to the Stryd app can cause multiple workouts in Stryd app if you for example keep on walking or running after completing the workout in the watch, before doing the Stryd pod offline sync.

Stryd documentation also states that the Race Predictions could be inaccurate because of the missing metrics mentioned above, unless user always does the offline sync after the workout.

Improvements that I would like to see

Of course the best option would be to have a complete integration like Coros does. That way all the data would be recorded and displayed by default.

It might however not happen, so here are the things listed individually:

1. Would be nice to see a new option for the watches “use foot pod for Distance and Pace” when a foot pod is connected. This does not need to be enabled by default, could be opt-in. If I understand correctly, this would make the Pace more stable (e.g. when GPS is used Pace can lag sometimes), and make Pace changes instant.

2. Add native support for Elevation, Leg Spring Stiffness, Vertical Oscillation, Form Power, Ground Contact Time, or Air Power from the Stryd pod (I know that Suunto Run already supports Ground Contact Time and Vertical Oscillation). The metrics could be viewed in the Suunto app without having to jump to the Stryd app. This would also eliminate the hassle of doing the offline sync from the Stryd pod after each workout.

3. Add support for showing graphs for the all the Stryd metrics in the Suunto app. This is definitely the least important thing and only a “nice to have” feature.

[Ze Stuart]

@sloppysloper canonical answers for you:

• the Stryd app in the Suunto store was made by Suunto with very little involvement from Stryd
• the above app only captures partial metrics; all other data not captured is lost
• Suunto limits the number of connections/data streams to 6 per app, but the pods have 19. Even if you made 3 apps, each capturing six streams, you’d still miss one

I had a go a developing a better Suunto app for Stryd integration, but while working the problem and chatting with Stryd, there’s no way around the offline sync ugliness. Well. Unless you want to build your own Suunto app that also syncs with the pods at the same time…

[sloppysloper]

@Ze-Stuart Thanks for the comments, nice to hear that there are other people interested in the topic.

In my case I’m using the Suunto Run, which does not have the SuuntoPlus store, so I don’t have any experience of using the Stryd SuuntoPlus app.

From what I understood, the Stryd app from SuuntoPlus can be used to display some of the Stryd metrics live during the run, but does not affect the workouts in the Suunto app.

Instead of a SuuntoPlus app, what I would like to see would be a better built-in integration of the food pod data to the Suunto watches, since currently the watches only support a few of the available metrics that Stryd pod is able to provide.