Custom Workouts Come to FORM
As we have written about FORM Swim and its ecosystem over the last few months, one of the main criticisms has been about the lack of flexibility in between the app and the google. Either you free-swim, and use the goggle to monitor metrics through the swim, or you follow one of FORM's training plans or workouts to have the goggle prompt you through the swim.
That changes today.
FORM has rolled out Workout Builder to the app as of this morning. (If you are a FORM user, now would be a good time to check your respective mobile App Store for an update to your platform). Workout Builder now gives you the option to build a completely custom workout for yourself, or for you to be able to modify any of the thousands of workouts within their workout library to your heart's content. Then, just like any other FORM workout, sync via the mobile app and be able to have it prompt and display directly in the goggle.
Paul Hossack, FORM's Vice President of Product, made mention that being able to upload custom workouts to the goggle was a key for members: "…our top requested feature since we launched Workouts one year ago."
Now, yes, there are some minor caveats: it is a manual process to build a workout. You need to use their nomenclature for specific set-types. But, that being said, it did take me less than five minutes to build multiple workouts that my coach had written to swim with and use the goggle — roughly the same amount of time that it takes for me to write my workout on my hand. Each workout can have up to 50 sets, and each set can be comprised of up to 50 subsets. Those of you who enjoy a casual 100 x 100 can build that in multiple ways, if you chose to.
That said, we know the next feature request from our readers — where, say, similarly to Zwift, you create a link between TrainingPeaks and Zwift and your workout magically appears in the app and goggle. When asked about this would be a potential future release, Hossack noted that "we're constantly looking at ways to expand upon this for efficiencies for the end user. Workout Builder was born out of our customer feedback, and we're deeply engaged with the swim and coach community. We have more plans in store for Workout Builder, this is just the beginning."
As of now, though, Workout Builder is much like the rest of the FORM app — it's simple, straightforward, and works as it should. You can't ask for much more than that. You may join FORM here, with a reminder that you may receive a discount on your initial annual membership by using the code SLOWTWITCH at checkout.
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