Track on your Apple Watch
The free Hoolan app transforms your Apple Watch into an advanced tracking and analysis device for all your kitesurfing, wingfoiling and windsurfing sessions. Hoolan tracks exclusively using smartwatches as we firmly believe they offer the best tracking experience on the water.
Currently, Hoolan is available for Apple Watch. We also offer a Garmin integration and have a Garmin watch app and an Android phone app in development. Sign up for our platform updates to keep in the loop.
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Get started tracking your sessions on your Apple watch:
Set up
Hoolan is compatible with Apple Watch SE 1st gen and above, using watchOS 7.0 and above, and iPhone6 and above using iOS 14.0 and above.
STEP 1
Make sure your watch and phone are paired.
On your phone, go to the Watch App, click 'All Watches' in the top left and check your watch is there.
STEP 3
Open the Hoolan app on your watch.
Making sure you have your phone in close proximity, press ‘SET UP’. You will be asked to grant certain permissions to Hoolan:
1. Access to your location
This is essential for us to be able to track your sessions. Please select 'Allow whilst using the app' and make sure 'Precise' is on.
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2. Access to Apple health and fitness
With your permission, we are able to record your heart rate and calories burned alongside your session, and for your sessions to count as an Apple workout. We ask for the following permissions:
​These are optional but we recommend you accept them to get the best experience from Hoolan. Apple Health permissions explained.
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Once permissions have been granted, you're straight to the 'Recording' screen, ready to track your first session.
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Write access to workouts
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Write access to workout routes
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Read Access to your active energy and heart rate
Recording your session
STEP 1
Adjust your settings on your watch
Swipe right from the main Hoolan recording screen to get to the Settings screen. From here you can configure:
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Your Unit Settings - we allow the flexibility to mix metric and imperial if you wish.
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The Fast Finish feature - end your session quickly and easily by pressing the crown and side button at the same time. Choose for it to activate on a single press, a double press (default) or not at all.
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Your Jump Detection Settings - select the activities for which you'd like to record jumps and choose the height threshold for live jump alerts.
STEP 2
Record and waterlock
Select your activity, board type and kite/ wing/ sail size and press START.
A waterlock is automatically activated on your screen to prevent falls or splashes affecting the recording. This is represented by the blue water droplet and means that touching the screen will not have any affect at all.
STEP 3
View your stats as you ride
RIDING SCREEN
Speed, distance, recording time, last jump, highest jump and heart rate.
LIVE JUMP ALERT
Jump height, airtime and jump distance.
To make sure that the recording screen isn't obscured by pop up alerts or notifications whilst you're riding, we recommend that you set up a Fitness Focus.
STEP 4
Save your session
Option 1:
Our fast finish feature allows you to finish and save your session without touching the watch screen. A quick, short press of both the digital crown and the side button at the same time will finish and save your session, ready to be uploaded once your watch has an internet connection. You can configure the fast finish to activate on one press, double press (default), or not at all. This works whether the waterlock is on or off.
If your watch takes a screenshot when you try to fast finish your session, this is a configuration issue on your watch and easily fixed. On your watch, go to Settings App > General > Screenshots - toggle the Enable screenshots to off.
Option 2:
If you prefer, you can also finish and save your session using the watch screen. By doing it this way, you have the option to discard a session before it uploads to your phone. Firstly, deactivate the waterlock. On all watches running watchOS 9 and above, press and hold the digital crown. Otherwise, you need to rotate the digital crown. You can then swipe to the left to 'Finish' and your session will be saved, ready to upload.
Your session will feed through automatically to your phone as soon as your watch has an internet connection - pull down on the Session Feed screen to refresh. In the rare circumstance that you can't see your session on your phone, please retry your session upload.
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Don’t wear your watch under a wetsuit (ideally)
This may affect the gps tracking, which may in turn affect the quality of your session data. The gps signal is strongest if the watch face is pointing up to the sky.
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Wear your watch on your skin
If not, it will lock and you won't be able to see the screen as you ride. It will still record your session. If you prefer to wear your watch over a wetsuit or find that your watch sleeve keeps on knocking the watch off your skin, you are still able to see your stats on your watch screen if you turn off wrist detection on your watch. Be aware, however, that you will not then be able to record your health data.
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Open the Hoolan app on your watch before you start recording
This gives the gps a chance to warm up and find your accurate location.
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You can start recording before you get into the water
The app is smart enough to figure out when you're actually riding. Likewise, you won't have to finish the recording until you've come off the water.
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Make sure you have a secure strap
We recommend either the Apple Solo strap or the Spigen Rugged Armor Pro Apple Watch wrist band. To be on the safe side, you could always secure your watch with an extra strap/ string.
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Charge your battery
Hoolan has been developed to be as efficient as possible and doesn't use up huge amounts of battery, however we do always advise having it well charged before you head out. Rest assured, if your battery were to run out mid-session, we're saving all your data to your watch as you ride, so when you next open Hoolan on your watch, your data will auto-upload to your phone where you can see your stats. Please note, if you choose to enter power saving mode on your watch, your session won't be recorded. If you're not jumping, or only jump on a certain board type, you can switch off jump detection which will save battery usage.
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Set up 'Fitness Focus' on your watch
By doing this, you shouldn't get any pop up alerts or notifications that obscure the data on the Hoolan recording screen as you ride. Set up 'Fitness Focus'.
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Set your haptic alerts to prominent
After every jump, your watch will buzz to let you know that your jump metrics are visible on your watch screen. Set your haptic alerts to 'prominent' for the best chance of feeling these buzzes.
See instructions on how to manage Apple Watch haptic alerts.
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Fast finish and save
As riders, we know that trying to finish a session by touching the screen with wet/cold/sandy fingers can be difficult. To make this easier, we have implemented a short cut: a short press of both the digital crown and the side button at the same time, twice, within a 1.5 second period, will finish and save your session. This double press is the default, but you can configure the 'fast finish' to be activated by a single press, or not to activate at all. This works whether you have the waterlock on or off. You always still have the option to save your session in the normal way by screen touch. Fast finish and save feature explained.
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Add a Hoolan complication
Access the Hoolan app with just one touch from your main watch screen. Learn how to add a Hoolan complication.
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Set up your Action Button
If you have an Apple Watch Ultra, you are able to set up the Action Button to take you straight to the Hoolan recording screen.