I used my Garim 301 for the entire race and loaded it up to motionbased.com. The GPS has the distance almost dead on. Check it out - but no cracking on my time:) It’s a pretty cool tool - I actually swam a pretty straight line!
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.
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.
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?
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.
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
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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
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.