Since the Instagram revolution everyone likes to show off their skills. If you can’t walk on your hands, nail the Scorpion Pose or smash out Voodoo Child on the ukulele should you even have an account? However, you quit your dance classes and music lessons as soon as your mates started hanging out at the park after school and now you can barely get off the sofa without groaning and wouldn’t know where to put your fingers on a Uke.
The Halo Sport aims to speed up the process of whatever you are trying to learn or improve and comes in the form of a set of over-ear headphones with Neuropriming technology. “What the hell is that,” I hear you cry. Well, lock in; I’m going to (badly) explain right now.
Neuropriming, which sounds a little Nineteen Eighty-Four, is a way of using electrical stimulation, such as transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), to increase plasticity in the brain prior to an activity, like stretching your hamstrings before you head out for a run, except it’s your brain…and electric. Banish those One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest images from your mind, it’s nothing like that (they don’t provide you with a stick to bite down on), the electric simulation is quite painless and feels like a little tingling across your head, which isn’t unpleasant. Each session last 20 mins and aims to provide you with an 80 min period of ‘hyper plasticity’, which decreases the amount of input required for neurons to fire and helps neurons fire together. This is meant to allow for rapid strengthening of connections in the brain.
The Halo isn’t the most comfortable thing to wear: the sensors across the head band are very firm, but thankfully the session only lasts 20 minutes. The sound quality is reasonable but not mind blowing, although the earpads are comfortable and block out background noise successfully. The premium construction makes you feel like you have got your money’s worth and there’s plenty of people out there who swear by its effects. My personal experience (when used before a run or weight training session) was that I had good sessions but wasn’t immune to the horrible, sluggish, weakling sessions that we are all have now and then. I’m sceptical and think that a lot of the positive effects could be down to a placebo effect; I often use meditation to prep myself before a workout and find the results similar.
If you have money to burn and don’t mind a few odd looks in the gym (or Spanish class), it could help you get in the zone before training or a lesson, even if it is only the belief in it that makes it work. If it works, it works! RRP £449.00
3.3 out of 5
Pros
Excellent build quality
Easy to use
Reasonable sound quality
Blocks out ambient noise
Comfortable earpads
Could accelerate gains from training
Cons
Expensive
Hard to know if it’s a placebo effect
App occasionally fails to connect
Sensors are uncomfortable
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