I want to level up my sleep and recovery and had ordered a Whoop 4 so I could better track key metrics and drivers. But now they have major delays on shipping and I see that Oura has just released a newer version of their wearable. Can anyone help me navigate the strengths and weaknesses of those two platforms from a training / racing cyclists perspective? It would be easy to cancel the Whoop order as it is many weeks away from fulfilment.
By way of context, I want to surface up sleep and recovery data in TrainingPeaks. Apple Health would be a nice to have but not essential by any means.
Also, I have tried an Apple Watch for this before but found that sleep tracking was not brilliant. Also I never figured out a good way to use the Apple Watch for general activity tracking through the day - but not for workouts where I have better data coming from my power meter and hrm.
On the last point, I have Strava/Garmin send cycling workout summaries to Apple Health. Then it syncs to Watch. Do the same with Strong app for strength and core.
Thanks @bbarrera - the challenge I had was that if I did a long ride wearing my Apple Watch, the activity would be effectively double counted and it was a pain to correct that. Make sense?
Regarding Oura 3 and sleep data: In the near term, the Oura 3’s sleep data will be the same as that of the Oura 2 (i.e. easy to check out). However, the Oura 3 includes a new SpO2 sensor and 7 temperature sensors. Sometime in 2022 (no date provided yet), they will be delivering a new sleep algorithm that incorporates data from these sensors in addition to their current sensors. Time will tell, but my expectations that they will have much improved sleep data, particularly for each of the phases. FWIW: I purchased the Oura 3 today mostly for this reason.
Thanks @bobmac . Makes sense. When you first went with the Oura 2 - did you also weigh it up against the Whoop 3? If so, curious about drivers of your choice (if you can remember).
Oura also announced that they are shifting to a subscription service. Six months free with the purchase of a new device, then a monthly fee. For me this is a non-starter. $300 USD is already steep just to track sleep and then add on a subscription, especially given that I already pay for TR, Z (my choice, I know), and a pool membership. Same gripe with Whoop, and it’s less accurate (according to DCRainMaker).
I use Sleep Cycle on my phone and manually add the sleep duration and quality to Metrics in TrainingPeaks. It’s basic, and I’d very much like to get HRV while I sleep (versus using another app after I wake up) but it’s good enough for tracking trends.
@RonG To clarify: I was not an Oura 2 user. Although I knew about it (and Whoop) from the TR Forum going back 2-3 years, I started looking at the Oura 2 just a couple of months ago after a friend purchased it. [And FWIW: I also took a look at another friend’s Whoop and his data (I didn’t want something on my wrist but wanted to see what kind of info he was getting for comparison).]
I am not sure if I would have purchased the Oura 2. Once the company announced the O3, what put me over the fence was not just the new added sensors and sleep data I mention, but the quality of the company itself and belief that they will deliver a great product and user experience over the long term.
scroll down to “How Health handles data from multiple sources” and change priority of data sources. I don’t look at step counts, but that does work for calorie burn and other stuff (I prioritize Strava over Apple Watch).
No one is using both of these currently. The Oura 3 isn’t in the hands of the public yet and a very low % of Whoop users have received their model 4’s.
I’m currently using a whoop 3 and oura 2, and my whoop 4 was shipped today - so I will be able to compare the whoop 4 sometime next week.
I recently posted a very high level summary of my opinion on the oura 2 and whoop 3 here:
Thanks for providing! His data collection and analysis is superb!
However, from my experience working with my otolaryngologist on my sleep apnea and my own experience training, his conclusive comments re: O2’s effectiveness for measuring sleep are not correct. Deep sleep is the most important phase for recovery. And while 75% accuracy against the gold standard polysonogram is well below the overall 96% that Oura claims, IMO, it does not justify his comments recommending the O2 not be used to measure sleep.
I found it interesting the info he provided on his decipher of Oura’s algorithm for readiness. And based on it, it easy to see why it may be useful as a measurement for general health but not very useful for athletes.
I look forward to his data and analysis of the O3 vs O2 after Oura introduces its new sleep algorithm in 2022.
On a related topic, Ray Maker provided his first impression review of the O3 (Oura gave him Beta product to test):
It was accurate after my 2nd vaccine shot. My score was 9% and I felt like shit. Other than that though, I feel it isn’t a great predictor of a given day’s performance, and it doesn’t always track sleep accurately. In fact, the device was giving me sleep anxiety, which is obviously counterproductive and goes against the point of having such a device to begin with.
No experience with Oura ring, but tbh it sounds like a contraceptive.
Hysterical! I bought the O3 and was thinking as I reviewed the specs prior to purchase that my eldest daughter would probably make good use for it in planning when to get pregnant in 2022.
I have an O2, I got it to understand my recovery better and in particular sleep. I was aware that sleep levels would probably not be too accurate but I had no objective data other than I didn’t think I slept enough. Overall I have been pretty impressed, it has given me some useful insights and picked up when I got a temperature and felt rubbish (not COVID). The Readiness score is just an indicator for me I look at it but go much more with how I feel. It does seem to be reasonably consistent.
Downsides are it does not synch with TrainingPeaks (least not that I have found) so I sometimes forget to add an activity to the Oura app. The O3 will overcome that issue.
I did not go with Whoop because I did not want a watch like device and the subscription costs seemed too much.
I am seriously thinking about the upgrade to a O3.
Just got the Whoop 4 yesterday after about 9 months of the 3. I honestly am not planning on renewing. The data doesn’t really drive much decision changes it just makes you aware of them BUT most of what it tells you is common knowledge…
The super-short version (using side by side) is that at this point Oura 3 isn’t really tracking your workouts yet. It basically just tracks three levels of intensity, based on a wild ass guess. That’s because they haven’t yet implemented the sport mode, which means their optical HR sensor is in lower power mode and thus doesn’t handle high intensity well (it’ll show 85BPM when I’m at 170BPM). They say the workout mode comes later this year. Sleep however is tracked well.
Whoop 4 does workout tracking, and in my running and riding tests, it’s doing incredibly well for accuracy. Leagues above where it used to be (which was Dumpster Fire status in V3, rendering it useless). Based on my data thus far, it’s nearly identical to the other sensors I’m using, with only slight lag and slight undercutting in very short sub-30 second efforts of high/sprint intensity. Not enough to meaningfully change the overall training load. I am however having some basic sleep tracking issues with it, which Whoop is digging into (like, completely missing the time I fall asleep by showing it hours earlier). I’ve never had sleep accuracy issues on Whoop previously in nearly two years of using it, so, that’s new.
