As simple as it may look, the device isn’t: Dura also has a full menu of navigation features, such as smart rerouting that uses Google Maps, ensuring the most up-to-date road closure notifications; turn-by-turn directions; an in-app route builder; and the option between topographical or landscape view. For those who like to research training plans or routines, there’s a full library of both, downloadable from the Coros companion app (iOS, Android), which offers everything from a four-minute voiceover.2 Maximum challenge for a basic six-week plan for beginners. Any custom training plan that can be downloaded to the Coros app can be synced to Dura.
Photography: Stephanie Pearson
More pros: Pairing it with an iPhone and an Android (separately) was trouble-free, and the device works seamlessly with its companion app as well as Strava, Training Peaks, Komoot, Ride with GPS, and others. (The Dura doesn’t sync with Zwift yet, but promises to soon.) The display is intuitive to use. At 2.7 inches, the size isn’t pleasantly compact, but cyclists with less-than-perfect vision may have to squint to check speed, grade, distance, heart rate, time of day, and ride time on one screen, and average power, lap power, speed, heart rate, grade, cadence, average speed, and distance on another (if riding with both a heart rate monitor and a power meter).
I found the color maps very helpful the day I went to Redhead, a mountain bike park in northern Minnesota that I’d only been to once before and needed help navigating the trail network. There are also plenty of ways to keep you on track with alerts for speed, cadence, heart rate, nutrition, and power, all of which I happily turned off.
Broken dreams
What interested me most was how the promised simple user interface, durability, and battery life translated into practice. Two of us tested it for a few months of mountain biking and gravel riding, and the good news is that the battery life is actually as robust as Coros claims.
Photography: Stephanie Pearson