Smartwatches and combat sports don’t mix. Whether you train Muay Thai, BJJ, wrestling, or MMA, wearing a smartwatch during training is uncomfortable at best — and dangerous at worst. Between gloves, clinching, grappling, and high-intensity rounds, accurately tracking heart rate and training load becomes almost impossible.
In this video, I break down why smartwatches like the Apple Watch Ultra and Garmin watches struggle in combat sports environments, and how I finally found a better way to track my training without wearing a watch on my wrist.
I walk through my thought process, including why I didn’t go with Garmin’s more expensive heart rate strap, and why I landed on a simpler chest strap solution that still integrates perfectly with my Garmin ecosystem. This setup allows me to track heart rate, training load, and recovery data accurately during sparring, rolling, and pad work — without smashing a watch or ruining sessions.
This isn’t about chasing numbers or obsessing over data. It’s about managing fatigue, avoiding overreaching, and training hard for years without burning out — especially as you get older and combat sports start to take a bigger toll on the body.
Chapters
00:00 – The Problem
01:10 – Why It Matters
01:35 – The Backstory
01:55 – The Near Perfect Option
02:57 – The Perfect Option
04:50 – The Important Stuff
If you’ve ever tried wearing a smartwatch for BJJ, Muay Thai, wrestling, or MMA and thought, there has to be a better way, this video is for you.
Note: Luke Cameron is the original author of this video, we just embed it, if you have any questions please contact him via Youtube.
