MyZone MZ-3
With an ever increasing number of fitness trackers coming on to the market, we certainly weren’t considering a heart-rate monitor strapped to our chest. The MyZone MZ-3 Belt (a slightly misleading name as the device is worn around your chest) is an activity tracker that is set to change the way you consider your beats per minute.
Once registered and strapped on, you listen for the beep and begin your exercise of choice and prepare to reap the benefits it offers. With accurate beats per minute measurements, calorie burn, maximum heart-rate calculation and the all-important MyZone Effort Points (MEPs), you will be able to track your cardio fitness. And if you have even the slightest competitive edge, you’ll become addicted to challenge both yourself and the rest of the community.
Price
The MyZone MZ-3 costs £129. The company also offers a sports bra for £49, which comes in three sizes (small, medium and large) and features an integrated strap, which the manufacturer says offers “greater comfort and support for the wearer”. You can also buy replacement straps directly from MyZone, which cost £9.99.
If this sounds expensive there are a variety of third-party fitness companies and operators that offer up to £50 off when purchasing through their websites. There is a catch, though: buying through a third party in this way will mean that the company in question will be able to some of the health data collected via the device. This is anonymous and is for further development of the services and activities MyZone offers.
Features
Let’s get this straight: the MZ-3 is a heart-rate tracker. It’s not a fully featured activity tracker like the Fitbit Surge, or anything else that has built-in GPS, altimeter and other sensors. You are not going to see the number of flights of stairs you climbed, nor the number of steps you took – or the distance travelled.
It isn’t a standalone product, either, and will ideally be paired via Bluetooth to a phone or compatible watch. You can also sync data to a PC using its proprietary USB cable. As an alternative to many wearable devices the MZ-3 outputs on a analogue 5.3KHz radio frequency, which is compatible with a lot of conventional cardio equipment in your local gym as well as analogue heart rate watches. With such a variety of pairing options the MZ-3 should suit many people, and with up to 16 hours of data storage, you even have the option of exercising free from your smartphone (you can sync the data afterwards).
The MZ-3 really comes in to its own when paired with the free MyZone app, which is freely available for Android and iOS and includes apps on Apple Watch and Android Wear smartwatches. Along with the expected calorie burn total and highly accurate heart rate measurement (which MyZone claims is 99.4 percent of the medicalstandard EKG’s), the ‘Effort Stream’ displays the current percentage you are exercising at, which in turns rewards you with your MEPs.
While other wearables will measure heart rate (many of them less accurately than the MZ-3), they don’t reward you as much for effort. It’s this reward of receiving MEPs is what really sets it apart from its competitors: the gamification of your heart rate.
In essence, the higher your heartrate zone and the time you spend within that zone determines that amount of points you are rewarded.