H2O Audio Review/Test

My parents got me the H2O Audio Interval and 2nd gen. Ipod Shuffle for my birthday. I'm hoping to improve my swimming this year, and I thought this might help on my long endurance swims. Masters is anything but boring so I don't need it there, nor would I want to wear it during masters class, But that's only twice a week so I plan on swimming in addition to masters, and I think one of those workouts is going to be a long endurance swim - maybe an hour of straight swimming or I might break it down into sets of 20 or 30 minutes. Either way, I thought music might help keep me from getting bored.

So today I gave my H2O Audio its first test run. I went to the Y to work on my backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly and flip turns. That was the first half of my workout. Then I figured I'd get my music set up and swim for a while to get in some easy distance and test out my new toy.

The first thing I learned is that setting up the H2O Audio while you're in the pool and soaking wet isn't the easiest thing to do. I think your best bet is to get it set up while dry in the locker room and do your entire workout with music. That's my plan for next time. It's not that it's tough to set up; it's just a little tricky because your hands are slippery.

The mistake I made was not testing out the headphones prior to swimming. You get several sizes of ear plugs because you need a tight fit. They come with mediums on, and I thought those would be fine...nope. I needed small, possibly extra small. Changing the ear plugs while standing on the side of the pool was tricky, but I got it figured out.

Once I got the headphones in my ears, I pulled my swim cap over my ears to help keep water from pulling the headphones out. They stayed put while swimming, but I think they could come out if you don't pull your swim cap down to cover them up.

The main question everyone wants to know - and I was curious myself - was if you could tell you had an MP3 player strapped to the back of your head while swimming. And, how it is during flip turns.

I figured I would be able to hear the music well enough, because without that H2O Audio doesn't even really have a product. So my main concerns were it catching water and pulling my goggles down....and comfort. I thought it would drown out all sounds and all I would hear was music, but that's not the way it works. You can still hear the water splashing as you swim but it's muffled. It's kind of cool, actually. The music sounded great. No complaints on the sound quality. And I didn't notice it at all. I was amazed. I forgot it was back there, and flip turns were no exception.

As for actually swimming with the H2O Audio, there's not that much to say. I didn't notice it and the music sounded good. Getting it set up so the ear plugs are in good and the cords are tucked out of the way so you can pull your cap down and then getting your goggles situated is the toughest part about this product. It doesn't make it difficult to use; it's just more challenging than normal headphones.

I think the next time I use it I'll get it set up in the locker room where I'll be dry and I can use the mirror. Then I'll do my entire workout with music and see how that goes.

All in all, I'm really happy with it. This was a great present and I think it's going to help a lot on my long swims. I didn't swim very long today, but time went pretty fast. I'll post updates as I use it more.

Here are a few pics:

It's pretty small. I almost used my credit card to demonstrate the size, but then
I realized putting a picture of my credit card on the Internet isn't very bright.

Here it is on my goggles.