Five reasons to wear Aftershokz Trekz Titanium

Like many runners, I find it very difficult to go out on the “longer runs” (or in my case, 5km) without music. I find running quite boring, so need the distraction of my favourite playlist or podcast. Ive mainly run with either aukey Bluetooth headphones or yurbuds wired but have always fancied the Aftershokz Trekz Titanium headphones. The Yurbuds once in, do not fall out but the aukey ones needs to have a bit of work to get them.in properly to enable them to stick.

However, as I have started to run on the road more, both of these headphones weren’t the safest option – blocking out a lot of noise and therefore making me less aware of my surroundings. I decided to take the plunge and buy a pair of Aftershokz Trekz Titanium headphones and now I have run a number of training runs and two 10km races, I thought I would give you five reasons why they should be on your shopping list.

1. Safety – The special bone conducting transducers vibrate music through the jawbone into the inner ear. This means you can hear everything around you – people breathing heavy behind you or the trainers hitting the road
2. Great fit – the cable around the neck connecting the two headphones are coiled and “squeeze” the head – meaning they grab around the head. Along with the over the ear design, they don’t move or fall from their place. They also fit around the sunglasses arms, they’re not fighting for space around the ear.
3. Lightweight – officially the Trekz Titanium weigh 36g – basically when on the ears, you don’t feel any weight – indeed sunglasses probably weigh more
4. Long battery life – officially, up to 8 hours between charges. I’ve never ran that far so couldn’t actually tell you. However they have lasted long enough for me to remember to put them on charge via the micro USB (same as most mobile phones)
5. Only “headphones” officially authorised by UK athletics. If you run in most UK affiliated races, the official line is that no headphones are allowed due to safety. However, due the the unique bone conduction technology, the Aftershokz Trekz Titanium are authorised for use. TBH it would be difficult to stop everyone racing with headphones, but at least you won’t be disqualified after the fact.

 Two things to note about the headphones:

• Sound quality – as the bone conducting vibration doesn’t fit directly into the ear, they do not provide heavy bass. To be fair, Aftershokz have done a good job – but compared to the sound quality of the Yurbuds, they score about a 7/10
• Expensive – the RRP of the Aftershokz Trekz Titanium are £100. Compared to the aukey Bluetooth of £20 and many very good Bluetooth headphones all at around £70. It’s a big jump to spend £100 on these. Especially as the sound quality is not quite up there.

I’ve now had my Aftershokz Trekz Titanium headphones for three weeks and I don’t regret spending the money on them at all. Sound quality is good, but most importantly I can listen to music whilst making sure I can hear my surroundings.