Cool thanks for sharing. Pretty neat to have the HR info be incorporated in with GPS info. I was interested in the wind speed data, about 15mph with a max of 19mph or so. From watching on IMLive it seemed to be gusting stonger than that at times.

---

----------------------------------------------------
Striving to have sex more than 66 times per year

Very interesting, THANKS!

---

-
"Yeah, no one likes a smartass, but we all like stars" - Thom Yorke


smartasscoach.tri-oeiras.com

Great....

Now I have to upgrade from my 201.

I never thought about using it on a swim.

---

_____________________________________________
Cheers,
Paco

Thanks MUCHO for those links. Very sweet info.

Having the HR info included is soooooooooo nice. My IMAZ bike is public on MB as well..but my "race" ended around mile 55 and turned into a training day. Glad I stuck with it....as I saw a different IM than ever before. Humbling is perhaps the best word.

How did you wear your 301 for the swim?

Was each activity a separate lap or did you reset for each event?

I use the new 2.68 mulitsport functionalty..it rocks it accounts for Transitions and all. Makes it real simple, just have to hit the lap button and it switches disiplines.

As for the swim - I wore the watch under my swim cap with the strap flat against my head, basically running from almost my hairline in front to my hairline in back. To hold the Garmin in place I wore my goggles (as I always do) under my swim cap. My goggle strap is a two piece, I basically put the Garmin in between the straps and it stays in place. Get out of the swim, hit "lap" and it's into T1 you go.

Is v2.68 only for the 301? I have the 201 and I would like that feature, especially for bricks, and race simulation.

---

----------------------------------------------------
Striving to have sex more than 66 times per year

So much for all those people trying to account for slower than expected bike splits by saying the bike was 116 miles long according to their computer, huh?

From what I can tell, yes v2.68 is only for the 301

That is, without a doubt, one of the coolest things I've seen. A couple of questions:

Your under-the-cap trick for the swim is slick. I saw on the Garmin site that the 301 is rated for only 30 minutes in up to 1 meter of water. Are you sure it's safe (for the 301) to have it wet for over an hour?

Do you know how the distance/elevation calculation works for the run/bike? That is, if you go, say, 10 miles up a 10% grade, does it only record the horizontal distance traveled, or do you get the whole 10 miles? I know that the 201 does NOT take elevation changes into account when calculating distance. So you could climb K2 and get hardly any distance traveled.

How the hell does the 301 measure wind speed?

again, thanks, that's cool stuff.

-Colin

---

------------------------------------------------------------
Any run that doesn't include pooping in someone's front yard is a win.

Very cool!

Don't you actually mean v2.63?

Pressure at 1 meter under water is much greater than under your cap so I would think there wouldn't be any problem. I can't believe my cap would stay on but I have a pretty big noggin.

I thought both the 201 and 301 took elevation into consideration for distance. I saw it on MotionBased's forum discussing why Garmin and MB come up with slightly different distances for the same workout (different formulas involving elevation).

For wind speed and temp. I think MB just connects to an online weather source for that zip code

PB - You hit it dead on...wind speed & temp are actually based on the nearest airport based on your actual location, in this case it was PHX Sky harbor for IMAZ.

Garim under the cap issue - I've have no problems, if you think about it, the cap forms a very tight bond around your head, and the swim cap typically has some extra room near the top. It works quite well.

I don't have a clear understanding of the elevation into consideration for distance issue at this point. - I need to read more

Not bad for Clyde!!

The links are great, I jut got a Garmin GPS eTrex Legend for my birthday and have not had the chance to play around with it much yet. Mainly for camping and hiking, but cool none the less.

Great time too, especially with the winds. You and I traded back and forth on the bike a lot. I was on the QR Caliente, bib #142 (Stephen).

Congratulations on a good race on a tough day, always good to see fellow Clydes having a good race.

Steve

---

----------------------------------------------------

Formally azclydesdale, back in Northeast Ohio.

re: the wind speed. that makes more sense hearing they just took the sky harbor measurements. out on the beeline and mckellips where there was absolutely no relief, it was blowing stronger than that i am certain.

---

f/k/a mclamb6

Very cool post to Motionbased.

I assume you started the watch through your swim cap then. I have the 301, but would be fearful that I hadn't started the watch properly without the message on the watch that says "Timer Started." I may test it out at a local race to help decide whether to use it during IMLP.

Not true. I had a 201 and took it on long and/or steep climbs all the time.Tthe distance matched my bike computer almost exactly.

My 201 started acting up, so I took it back and decided to upgrade to the 301. It was a great decision as there are several improvements in addition to the hr function. It seems like every small thing I didn't like about the 201 has been fixed w/ the 301.

Quite possibly the best advertisement I've seen for the Garmin...

I was thinking about getting one for IM AZ but didn't. Thanks for your post & congrats on your IM finish...

The Garmin is a very nifty tool....but it's really MotionBased that brings everything together (corrections, elevations, etc)

I wouldn't have bought my 201 w/o MotionBased. The Garmin logbook is awful. Is the Logbook with the 301 any different?

That's interesting. All I know is that when I bought my 201, I emailed Garmin with that same question, and they answered that the distance was "as the crow flies"; that is, straight line distance not taking any elevation change into account. I never had the oppurtunity to really test that.

I also asked them specifically about swimming, because if you could wear that sucker on your wrist, it would be the ultimate open-water swimming tool. They said that it was not rated for swimming, and not to do it. I assume that the waterproofing is the same for the 301, as it says on the website.

This makes me wonder why they would have multisport options for it, that includes swim and T1 times. That's a bit silly if they say don't swim with it, but we will record your swim time.

-Colin

---

------------------------------------------------------------
Any run that doesn't include pooping in someone's front yard is a win.

That is weird. I specifically took mine out on one of my regular hillclimbs after I got it just to check and it was spot on. I don't use a bike computer anymore, but it's always read virtually the same as the guys bike computers around me, regardless of terrain.

jnielsen - Thanks for posting this. I had pretty much decided to get the 301 already but this just sealed the deal.

Smitty - From what I have read; With the 301 they have gotten rid of the old log book and replaced it with a much better program. Here is a link to the website. http://www.garmin.com/...ucts/trainingcenter/

I just ran the numbers, and we probably wouldn't be able to tell either way.

If you climb 10 miles at 10% grade, your linear (horizontal) distance is still 9.95, totally in line with any error the Garmin might have. Since a very small number of us ever climb 10 miles at 10% (let alone climb it regularly), it should really never be an issue. Interesting, though, that is was correct vs. a bike computer. My 201 wasn't ever that close.

-C

---

------------------------------------------------------------
Any run that doesn't include pooping in someone's front yard is a win.

I did the race and both bike & run felt pretty flat to me. It didn't feel like 4k of elevation change on the bike and 3k on the run. Is this really correct?

Did you wear the HR strap? Curious about that one.



Thanks

I remember you...it's great to see a fellow Clyde out there. You had a great ride as well!

Unbelievably cool. Is the software compatible with Macs?

I don't think the Garmin specefic SW is MAC compatible. But what I posted was using a free web-based site. I wouldn't think it would be a problem, but you should ckeck with montionbased.com to verify.

Very cool... I have the 201 but I think the 301 is in my near future. Have you tried topofusion? It allows you to 3d render your workouts from satellite photos as well as topo maps. If you are in an urban area the resolution is .25 meters!

---

----
Don't hold back

That is unbelievably cool... I have the 301 but never thought it could do all that... thank you for showing us what it can do.

Dude, what an awesome post.

Thanks again,

Trev

---

Trev Williams
http://www.thedoctrine.ca

Someone already asked but I'm gonna bump to ask it again - whats up with the elevation data? 4200' of climbing for IMAZ? I can't see any computer generating that much on that course no matter how high the resolution.

Do 301 owners typically find thier elevation data to be this wacky or exaggerated?

ot

I think the forum just ate your response...

ot

How did you get your data uploaded to MB. I am using a 301 and MB will not synch my data with my watch. It is all there, swim, T1, Bike, T2 and Run. I had no trouble getting it into Training Center. Is there a trick?

Congrats by the way.

Pepper

The elevation issue is my only complaint with the 301. I think it has a hard time with the resolution of the elevation. If you stand in one spot you will notice that the elevation may vary +/-20 feet continuously. This is where you get the wacky numbers for elevation. I did a 10k in downtown Houston in February and the 301 said there was 600 feet of climbing - not a chance / it may have been 5 feet of climbing. I had a friend do a 60 mile ride west of Houston that had almost 3000 foot of climbing. Actual elevation change was 50 feet max. The only climbing in Houston is in the downtown parking garages.

Elevation seems to be the only problem. Distance is not - If I run different sides of the street on a run it will show this linear distance change. Maybe as the software evolves the elevation will get in line.

cowtippers,

You are on to part of the problem of measuring altitude with GPS data from consumer GPS devices.

These devices are not all that accurate in measuring altitude variations accurately, especially on rolling terrain.

I have tested software for the 201 and 301. It has been my experience that the variation between the GPS data that these devices record and topographic information for the same route generally varies by 25-35% on the low side for GPS measured elevation changes. The maximum variation that I have observed is 44% lower than the topographic record. The smallest variation I have observed was 4% but this was a glaring isolated instance! The next closest variation was over 20%.

On flat routes, the variation tends to be a positive variation, again in the 25-35% range. The biggest contributor to these variations appears to be the "floating" nature of consumer GPS elevation readings.

This is one of the primary reasons that most consumer GPS units that advertise the measurement of elevation and elevation changes use barometric altimeters to measure elevation and elevation changes.

It has been my experience that the linear distance measurements of the 201 and 301 have been extremely consistent and accurate and the variation in linear distance measurement from topographic data for the same route has been less than 1% and generally in the 0.1-0.5% range.

I hope that help. FWIW.

---

Ben Cline


Better to aspire to Greatness and fail, than to not challenge one's self at all, and succeed.

I wasn't there, but probably not. This race was before MB added the "MB Gravity" feature, which uses cartographic data to correct the Garmin's problems with elevation. You can go back and run the MB Gravity feature on old data. In most cases, it will severely reduce the total elevation gain or lost. In one rare case I had, it actually increased the gain.

---

__________________________________________________
What a drag it is getting old. -- Stones