Polar's latest flagship fitness watch focuses on workout recovery

These days, the majority of wearables updates center on evolution rather than revolution since most of them are already plenty good enough. Polar’s newest flagship multi-sport watch, the Vantage V2, embraces this idea with a greater focus on the period of time around your workout. The emphasis is on determining whether you’re ready to do a full workout, and when you’ll feel the benefit of going hard on a given day.

That means that you’ll be able to test and see if your legs are ready for a training session with a new, “Leg Recovery Test.” That’s a similar set of insights that you’ve been able to enjoy on other Polar watches, like the Ignite, albeit with a focus on specific muscle groups.

Similarly, being able to run through running and cycling performance tests will enable you to set personal heart rate, speed and power zones. That should help you better target your own best performance goals, especially if you’re in the marginal gains crowd and you’re looking to shave seconds off your time. Another improvement with the V2 is weight reduction -- it weighs in at 52 grams, down from the 66 grams of the Vantage V.

There are a number of smaller, quality-of-life improvements available as well, including better playlist navigation and volume control for music playback. You’ll also be able to make a season-long training plan, with better analysis tools inside Polar Flow, the company’s companion platform. Oh, and you can now export your heart-rate variability data, which may be helpful if you’re working with a physician.

The Polar Vantage V2 offers 40 hours of continuous, GPS-based training with heart-rate tracking, and 100 hours if you’re not using GPS. It’s available today for $500 in Black, Green and Grey Lime, while you can grab it with the H10 Heart Rate Sensor for $550.