RepOne

[damufunman]

It finally came!

15 weeks later...

@damufunman I noticed that I can't toggle reps with buttons - only by tilting.. am I doing something wrong?

I think they are not touch capable.

From the email that came with my shipping notification:

We have some awesome firmware functionality coming your way soon via over the air firmware updates. Some of it is pretty simple like basic button functionality to navigate reps on the RepOne Sensor screen. Other features RepOne features like our 3D metrics will be coming soon

I got similar verbiage on my shipping email... back in November. They did implement battery improvement they mentioned.

[Hanley]

I got similar verbiage on my shipping email... back in November.

Oy. Seems like they're catching up with the backlog (mine shipped in under 3 weeks)...so maybe firmware-validation time.

[damufunman]

I got similar verbiage on my shipping email... back in November.

Oy. Seems like they're catching up with the backlog (mine shipped in under 3 weeks)...so maybe firmware-validation time.

That would be great. I worked with Jordan (I think) a little bit beginning of the year with some Beta releases, they found a couple of bugs with sending stuff to the stack (or some shit like that) that was messing with peak velocities and resets. Still getting too many disconnects but haven't reported anything since I can at least take an extra minute to grab the values from the display, just doesn't get recorded in the log.

Kinda unrelated, more from my training:
I did get a suspect reading of a 1.90 m/s NH Snatch last night, and video analysis is saying it was closer to 2.0 (slowest regular Snatch is 2.22 and I hit 2.06 a couple of times with No Hook). But if I actually did hit 1.90 that would be a good sign that I need to work more on my pull under.

[damufunman]

It finally came!

15 weeks later...

@damufunman I noticed that I can't toggle reps with buttons - only by tilting.. am I doing something wrong?

I think they are not touch capable. Just tilty to go through reps. I use the app for the most part, unless there's a disconnect, then I need to use the unit to get speeds. Rather annoying, actually...

Hmm.. not sure I like that. I'll use the app 95% of the time, but sometimes the OBB didn't always send the reps to my phone.

Couldn't update the firmware from my Samsung S10, either. Was told I would need to try to find a different device to use.

So some of the disconnects might be related to camera usage. Using the rear facing camera causes disconnects, hence the (kinda crappy) integrated camera functionality. But the front facing camera doesn't seem to cause problems for the most part, and you likely don't need the higher FPS from the rear camera.

[TimK]

Just wanted to come by here to say that I fucking hate basically everything about the Rep One app. It needs to be completely rebuilt from scratch.

[Hardartery]

Just wanted to come by here to say that I fucking hate basically everything about the Rep One app. It needs to be completely rebuilt from scratch.

Don't hold back, tell us how you really feel..

[gtl]

Just wanted to come by here to say that I fucking hate basically everything about the Rep One app. It needs to be completely rebuilt from scratch.

Heh, I guess I'm used to it from using Open Barbell for 5 years..

[damufunman]

Just wanted to come by here to say that I fucking hate basically everything about the Rep One app. It needs to be completely rebuilt from scratch.

Anything specifically? I kinda like it, but I'm coming from a terrible UI and needing to take a screenshot on my phone to record data so the RepOne app is a huge improvement.

[TimK]

Just wanted to come by here to say that I fucking hate basically everything about the Rep One app. It needs to be completely rebuilt from scratch.

Anything specifically? I kinda like it, but I'm coming from a terrible UI and needing to take a screenshot on my phone to record data so the RepOne app is a huge improvement.

You're talking about your DIY setup right? I mean yeah, I'm sure it's better than that, but I used the Speed4Lifts (now Vitruve) before my RepOne came in* and it's about 10x more polished. Way more intuitive and easier to use. It also looks a lot better, in a way that makes it easier to understand the data. The RepOne app looks like it was thrown together by a bunch of engineers with no input whatsoever from a designer. The UI is confusing and cumbersome.

Let's start with the workout tab. Why do I have to enter the name of the exercise for every set? I should be able to put it in once and have it stay on that lift until I change it. Even more frustrating is that you have to manually type in the name of an exercise several (I think three) times before it's saved as an option from the dropdown list. So my first time doing 3:0:0 Tempo Bench, for example, I had to type that out three times, hoping that I didn't put an extra space or something in there because then it would be recorded as a separate exercise and the data would be split up.

Also, a couple of days ago I did a top single followed by a backoff set of 6, but for some reason it was all recorded as one set of 7 even though it's supposed to automatically start a new set when the bar is racked for however long. I wanted to delete the single from the set and then enter it manually as a separate set, but there doesn't seem to be a way to do manual entry, so I just had to delete it and lose that data point.

Another thing that I hate is that it just shows raw data with no e1RM. S4L shows an e1RM for each rep based on the speed. Yes, if you just leave it on the defaults that's not very accurate but it at least makes the metrics more relatable day to day, and you can also enter your own equations and 1RM velocities to make it more accurate. I did that last year when training for my meet and I found the e1RMs to be quite close to my actual performance. I used those numbers to guide training decisions and it worked out well for me. With RepOne you have to go to the analysis tab to perform a 1RM, so you can't see that number dropping off from set to set or rep to rep, and it won't even work unless you enter an RPE for your sets, which is super annoying since one of the main reasons I wanted a velocity device was to avoid having to rely on RPE to gauge performance.

Trying to look back and see past performance is a total clusterfuck. Everything just blends together visually, whether we're talking about looking back on the workout you just completed or trying to see performance trends for an exercise over time. On the workout tab you just see a list of sets with no clear visual distinction between different exercises other than the name on each set. Same with the history tab, everything just runs together and there's no way to view anything visually. No graphs whatsoever. I feel like I need to copy all this data into my own spreadsheet if I actually want to understand it.

On S4L you can select the exercise you want to review and it will give you a very clear, easy to understand list with the dates that you performed the lift and the highest e1RM recorded, along with a button to view the full session data from that date. It also gives you an easy to read bar graph plotting date vs highest e1RM for the session. Easy to see how your strength on a lift has been trending. RepOne can't even show you more than one e1RM at a time (based on a date range) let alone graph it for you across your training cycle.

Another gripe I have is that I frequently have trouble pressing the buttons, particularly the tabs at the top (workout/history/analysis/settings) and have to jab at them from various angles before my touch registers. It's like the area detecting a press is too small or they're too close to the top of the screen or something.

While the S4L hardware lacks in some areas (mainly that you need to get the string vertical because it doesn't take the angle into account), it's better in others (it at least shows you a flashing light when you plug it into a charging cable, and then the light goes out when it's fully charged... when I plug in the RepOne there's no visual indication that it's charging at all unless I turn it on and pull on the tether first... but if it's completely dead this leads to confusion... and there was no charging indicator at all until a firmware update last September... how do you ship a device that doesn't even have a charging indicator???). Plus the S4L actually has buttons that work if I need to go through the reps manually. The tilting thing on the RepOne sucks, and why does it have two buttons that don't do anything?

The documentation is almost non-existent as well (this is it: https://getrepone.freshdesk.com/support/solutions ). There are a handful of brief articles, with a total of ONE screenshot from the actual app itself, just showing how to connect the app to the unit. There is no "manual" for how to use the device, no quick start guide, no real explanation of the different tabs and how to use them, what it looks like when you're actually doing a workout and recording your sets, etc. You're just left to figure it out on your own.

S4L also allows you to set audible alerts for % velocity loss or when you drop below a predefined velocity. It can call out your rep speed on every rep if you want it to. You can set a "velocity zone" to say inside and it will beep if you go out of it (either too high or too low). It even shows a visual bar graph representation of your rep speed as you lift so you can put your phone somewhere in sight and glance at it to see how your rep speed is progressing over the set. Also, since I last used it they have updated the app and now you can see at a glance (during your workout) the corresponding velocities for your current lift from the last three training sessions with the same load. I haven't used this yet but it sounds quite handy. They also now allow you to view more metrics during a set, including fatigue %.

The only big advantage for me of RepOne is that you can create any exercise you want, whereas you're stuck with a set of predefined movements in S4L/Vitruve. If that was not the case I would switch back to S4L without thinking twice. I hope they add the ability for custom exercises soon. Honestly, I might still switch back, and just use the S4L for my comp lifts and just stick to RPE alone for the million different variations I'm currently doing on this DDS program that I started recently. I really dislike managing the awful app interface constantly for multiple movements during every workout. I was going to try using an old unused phone as a dedicated device so at least I wouldn't have to switch back and forth between RepOne and my logging app, but after getting it set up on the old phone it failed to sync my recent workout data across so I don't know. I emailed them two days ago but haven't gotten a response.

I think they are way more focused on the "team" side of their business and are probably making a lot more money there, selling $100/month subscriptions and 50 units at a time. I think they figured 95% of individual lifters ordering a RepOne had been using Open Barbell already so they didn't even bother trying to update or improve the app (I've heard it's basically the same if not identical). Hopefully the half-assed app and firmware (like maybe make those buttons actually do something, and show a charging indicator when you plug it in?) can catch up to the hardware at some point.


*I bought the S4L even though I had a RepOne preordered on day one, because it was readily available and it had become apparent that the RepOne was not going to ship even remotely close to the projected date... good call because I ended up not getting it for another 8 months, three months after the meet I was planning to train for (which was cancelled due to covid anyway, but I did a mock meet at home on the same date.

[gtl]

@TimK

Your points are all valid. I really just use the app as a display, and log everything in Excel post set.

[damufunman]

@TimK
Thanks for the rundown, that's a lot!
I might have gone with the Vitruve/S4L if there was better support for Android, but alas, I'm into the RepOne. Better visualization and e1RMs would be wonderful and the charts was something I noticed on MikeT's IG posts. I've got the speed-% breakdowns for main lifts coded into my own app, and I have notes for each working set for speed target, but was hoping I could use the RepOne entirely for logging, but no dice. Oh well.

[Hanley]

The tilting thing on the RepOne sucks, and why does it have two buttons that don't do anything?

I don't really mind the clunky app ...but the tilty thing absolutely sucks. Just totally boneheaded.