Trainingsparkle vs Skoma

Trainingsparkle is the closest direct competitor Skoma has. It also turns training data into a printed book. It also tells races apart from ordinary sessions automatically. And it covers more sports than Skoma does: running, cycling, swimming, hiking and skiing among them, with templates that change by activity.

The two overlap heavily and differ at the edges. Trainingsparkle connects to Garmin directly and includes more pages. Skoma is Strava-native, hands you the layout to edit yourself, and starts lower with shipping included. Which matters more depends on where your data lives and how much you want to touch the design.

How they compare

Two book lengths, priced both ways

A 50-page Skoma book costs $49.99 in the US, delivered. Trainingsparkle’s hardcover starts at $59 for 75 pages, and their site lists shipping as extra. At 50 pages, Skoma is the cheaper of the two.

At 75 pages the order flips. Skoma charges $0.99 for each page past 50, so 75 pages comes to $74.74, still with shipping included. Trainingsparkle’s $59 plus shipping will usually come in below that.

So the real question is how long your book needs to be. One marathon block often fits in 50 pages. A full year across three sports usually doesn’t.

Where your data lives

Trainingsparkle reads Garmin Connect directly. Coros, Suunto and Wahoo are listed as in progress. If you never uploaded to Strava, that saves you a step.

Skoma connects to Strava. Anything outside Strava comes in as a GPX or FIT file exported from your watch app, or as a manual entry. That works, but it is one more step per activity.

Editing it yourself, or having it checked

Trainingsparkle lets you customise the book, then their team reviews each one for errors before it goes to print. You get the digital version after that check.

Skoma opens the draft in an editor where every photo, stat, map and caption can be moved, resized or replaced. Changes save as you go. There is no review step, so typos are yours to catch. A private share link lets someone else flip through it first.

Multi-sport seasons

Triathletes and runners who also ride a lot will find Trainingsparkle’s sport-specific templates a better fit. Skoma’s pages are designed around endurance races and multi-day journeys such as an ultra or the Camino. The layouts put the race at the centre, not the sport mix.

What both get right

Neither asks you to build a book from scratch. Both read your activities, find the races, and lay out a draft with your numbers and photos already in place.

Both print a hardcover. Both are a one-off purchase rather than a subscription. And both work best when you have logged your training consistently, with photos attached to the runs that mattered.

So the choice comes down to the edges described above: data source, sports, editing and book length.

Where Skoma falls short

No direct Garmin, Coros, Suunto or Wahoo connection. Files from those watches work, but you export them yourself.

Long books cost more. At 75 pages Skoma costs $74.74, against Trainingsparkle’s $59 plus shipping.

No one checks your book for you. That is the trade for being able to change everything.

A quick way to decide

One race season, all on Strava, and you want to arrange the pages yourself: Skoma.

A full year across running, riding and swimming, logged on Garmin, and you’d rather someone else checked the result: Trainingsparkle.

Somewhere in between? Price the page count you actually need on both sites. That number tends to make the choice.

Which should you choose?

Details reflect each provider’s publicly available information and may change; brand names are trademarks of their respective owners.