Any surfers bought the Watch yet?
Anybody tempted to take it into the surf given the positive reviews of its water resistance?
But maybe for a nice small day on a longboard?
Surfer of 12 years here bought my apple watch almost strictly for surfing knowing it was a gamble. I've been wondering for years how many calories I burn while surfing. I will preface with this; here is my first post and the only reason I signed up for a Mac rumors account (longtime reader) was to contribute and put this question to rest.
I have the 42mm stainless steel with black sport band watch.
After two months and 30 + sessions I am here to tell you that the watch is (so far) perfectly safe to surf with. I am in California on the beach with Malibu and Topanga point being my closest breaks. I've surfed from Santa Barbara to OC with my apple watch on. I've been in knee high to 2ft overhead surf, with a quiver of boards from 5'11 Al Merrick (short competition board) to 9'0 Robert August longboard. I've even gotten barreled with my watch on. I've had wipeouts, gone over the falls, slammed into rocks, luckily my watch was unscathed my back not so much.
I'm still planning to break it somehow out there but the more I surf with it the more I realize it's not likely to break unless it hits my board at the perfect angle. The main reason is we instinctively fall palms down or covering our head while surfing. Not likely places for impact unless it's winter pipeline conditions.
Here's some things to be mindful of:
The crown will get sand in it. So far, so good though, I just blow it out with my mouth and rinse with freshwater while turning the crown. This has worked every time and the crown returns to smooth turning. Same with the band button but not as much sand gets in it bc it's location is under the watch. Again blow, freshwater rinse and it's good. Maybe over time the salt will get to these parts but 60 days hasn't shown any signs that it is.
If attached to the wrist properly, the watch will never slip off of you while surfing. I was really scared at first but once I realized how the water doesn't even move the watch on my wrist, I don't even think about it anymore.
Some cool aspects:
I use the rowing feature in the native workout app at the moment. I can approximate my distance by calculating the rowing distance travelled but that also includes rides which are often and long on the point breaks here. I get a calorie count and time of my session which is nice, but that's about it.
I hope OS2 will allow for me to buy a surfing app that will tell me my calories burned while paddling, calories while waiting for waves, time waiting vs riding, ride lengths, all of this is easily possible with the hardware inside.
Hope this helps guys and gals!