I’m a retired software developer. I offer my services for free to get this feature designed, implemented, and tested. I would need to work remote. LMK if you want to see a resume - then we can talk.
Another Apple Watch user here and I’m really struggling to bring all the tech together and working well. Apple Watch has 56% of wearable market share so surprised that it’s not supported.
I took delivery of an Apple Watch Ultra 2 yesterday to replace my Wahoo Rival (now there are 11 people on earth left using a Rival, sorry guys).
I’m royally annoyed that I can no longer use my Apple Watch for heart rate directly, unless I use TR on my iPad rather than my iPhone.
Please, TR, put this higher up on the list of priorities, implement heart rate through Apple Watch and AirPods Pro 3. Ditto for syncing with Apple Health, I did my workout outdoors, but had recorded it before setting up the Apple Watch in the TR app.
Yeah I’ve been wearing the buds lately for HR they are nice. I know HR doesn’t really factor in the same way power does as far as training goes, but nice to keep an eye on. I end up tracking my ride in the background via Apple Fitness and swapping between apps near the end of intervals/rests to see where I’m at. Will probably cave sometime this spring and just buy a Garmin HR chest strap to get all my stats integrated.
I think that is Apple fault not TR. I do not know why apple are making it harder to use Apple Watch you need third part app to broadcast hr. I used to have one, its was nice accessory. Than moved to proper running watch from garmin. Garmin is few years ahead of apple. You can broadcast HR without third party app like AW. Same with apple HR in airpods. Apple doesnt care about athletes. They sell fashion watches. I love apple ecosystem, have iphone, airpods and mac. I am baffled that trillion dollar company wont make their watch broadcast HR to third party apps more easily, you cant broadcast to bike computers either. They have the best market share in watches. I think that there are zero athletes working on apple watch at Apple.
Hard disagree. IMHO it is TR’s job to support all big health/sports platforms. TR supports several platforms, Garmin, Strava and Wahoo being the biggest ones, but also smaller ones like Hammerhead.
Amongst TR athletes, people with Apple Health accounts, an Apple Watch and/or new AirPods Pro 3 is infinitely larger than the number of people using Karoo/SRAM Hammerheads.
I agree that Apple is making it harder than it should be by not including a HR or, better, a sensor broadcast feature. I’d love that. The fact that Apple is leaving out this feature makes it seem intentional, although I don’t understand their reasoning. (They have also never adopted Ant+ either even though that is another obvious one — or rather was since Ant+ is being phased out.)
But for athletes, this doesn’t matter. Other platforms have, hmmm, peculiarities as well, Strava comes to mind. TR’s job is to add features their athletes need. Even Strava, the company that a few years back removed support for many types of Bluetooth sensors, because “that was too difficult a task”, and needs years and years to catch up on seemingly basic feature requests, connects to Apple Watch.
It’d be nice to not just connect to my Apple Watch, but pause and resume workouts by tapping my watch rather than my iPhone or iPad, for instance.
I recommend you read e. g. @dcrainmaker’s coverage on the Apple Watch and watch OS, because that’s not his estimation. Apple has loads of athletes working on watch OS, and competitors like Garmin should really be concerned.
IMHO the biggest difference between Apple and Garmin is that that all Apple Watches are designed as small computers with a platform whereas Garmins are designed like bike computers as something that is mostly closed. It is much easier for Apple to enable really nice things like music, podcasts, Apple Pay, cellular service and satellite communication than Garmin.
Doubly so if you consider that watch OS is a fully fledged operating system with third-party apps, so Apple doesn’t have to do everything itself right away.
I would love Apple to make better and longer lasting watches, i liked mine. Yes, Apple watch is small computer, great device. I was considering AW ultra, but ended up with cheaper Garmin. How do you find the battery life? Does if charge fast? i.e if i have 15% battery life would i be able to charge it in 10-15 mins for hour long run? Mine did not have fast charging. I do not know any people with AwU, how do you find the action button, i hated changing screen on my AW while running (especially in rainy weather), is it better now? I miss some features from AW, learned to live without them. Sleep tracking on AW was superior to the garmin (for myself), much more accurate (naps too). It is a shame that i had to pay for my garmin watch to have spotify. I hope AWU has great battery life, maybe in the future i will consider going back to apple, garmin became really expensive.
In the time I have my shower and eat breakfast, my Ultra 2 goes from ~50 % charge to 90–95 %. So yeah, 15 minutes of charge should be plenty for a run.
I get more or less two days worth of battery life.
I can’t compare, this is my first Apple Watch. My wife has had one for many years (her first AW was a Series 3) who is a runner. She ran her first half marathon last weekend! 
The best thing about the AW is its integration with the iPhone. I have a much easier time picking up calls, logging medication and doing all sorts of small actions. One thing I missed on my Rival was weather info.
Thanks for the insight