Product: Petzl NAO Head Lamp
What is it:
The Petzl NAO head lamp uses a new ground breaking technology. It uses reactive lighting. What is that? Basically it has a sensor that monitors the reflection of light. So when you are looking at something close up it dims the light and when you look at something far away it brightens it. It has multiple settings. It has nonreactive mode which makes it a normal light and reactive mode. The reactive mode allows the head lamp to drastically reduce power consumption. The light features a 355 lumen boost mode. The head lamp also features a USB rechargeable battery and programable settings via a computer.
What is it used for and when:
Night time running/hiking.
Where can I buy it: http://www.petzl.com/en/outdoor/headlamp/nao
It comes out July 2012
How did you like it?:
First of all I loved this head lamp. I have had races where my head lamp would die or wouldn’t be bright enough to see the trail so I would be forced to slow down. This never happened with the NAO. The NAO is hands down the best light I have used. It is the future of lighting. It is also the best piece of equipment I have have gotten since starting running 5 years ago. This will easily help cut of minutes and hours off of peoples 100 miles times or any race where your running on a trail at night. Hands down if you can see what you’re running you will go faster. If you cant see what your running on you go slower. It’s that simple. This light gave me the confidence at night that I had in the day. I never slowed down. I also ended up spotlighting some deer with it. Never had a head lap do that before!
The battery life was amazing I ran all night and still had plenty of battery left for a couple hours of running the following night. I have been in search of a head lamp like this. I can not wait to pummel the competition at the UTMB races this summer!
My 2 favorite parts about the lamp were the reactive mode and the USB rechargeable battery. In reactive mode the lamp would dim at close up things. If you have a normal head lamp and you look at things up close it reflects back into your eyes and blinds you. With other lamps I find myself every so often messing with the lamp to dim it or brighten it. In reactive mode I turned it out and never touched it again until I was done.
The rechargeable battery means you won’t have to buy batteries or worry about needing to buy new batteries every time you go out over night. There is a charge indicator on the back of the batter to let you know how much juice is left.
If you are tired of not seeing the trail, tripping over things at night, tired of always adjusting your head lamp, having to carry extra batteries, and being worried your head lamp will die then this is the head lamp for you.
Reviewed by Run Bum Sean
