Ive used this. Basically laminate it with scotch tape and it works perfectly!
The thing with marathon courses is they cut every corner very close and the 26.2 miles is a very specific route during the race. So if you are off each mile by .02 your pace will not be accurate. I used a pace tattoo last year even with my Garmin because I knew I was going to run the course differently than they measured it. So you think you’re running a 7:10 mile pace but when you get to mile one you see you’re at 7:05 or 7:15. With the tattoo you know where you are supposed to be at for every mile so it takes the thinking out of it. This year at Chicago I tried to run the shortest possible course but I still ran like 26.4 or something. Not huge but if you are going for a specific time goal those few seconds per mile or 5k can mean a lot.
If you want to consider an alternative, I print something that I tape to the underside of my visor. Advantages - I can make it bigger and include both mile splits - which I can then vary for early/middle/late stages of the race, course terrain, etc. - and cumulative time. Disadvantage - you have to take off your visor to see it.
print it backwards, then attach a tiny mirror to your watch.
You want to make sure you get one course specific. Nothing like running miles 16 - 21 at Boston sticking to an even split chart to destroy your day … 
Because the garmin only tells you the last mile. It does not tell you how far off you are compared to where you want to be at that point in the race. If I need to run 7:09 pace, yeah I can see that I’m ahead on this mile and behind on that mile.
Actually the overall average pace display helps me with that. I use it all the time in training. If you want to run your 7:09 pace and you see that your averaging 7:11’s at mile 10, well then I know I’m 20 seconds behind (2 sec per mile over 10 miles). It’s been pretty accurate in my long training runs when I round up.
The thing with marathon courses is they cut every corner very close and the 26.2 miles is a very specific route during the race. So if you are off each mile by .02 your pace will not be accurate
Now this makes more sense to me. Basically, if you solely go by the Garmin, but the Garmin is off per the measurement of the course then you’re screwed if you’re cutting it really close.
GPS is off in general. If you are basing your entire performance off of the mileage given by the GPS you often will end up severely disappointed … It is a moderately accurate reference, not the end all be all. A certified properly measured and marked course and a simple watch will be a better accurate gauge.
exactly. As much as I was impressed with my friend running NYC marathon yesterday with near identical splits every mile, I am not sure I am capable of that. Even splits throughout are not going to be a lot of help if one mile is all uphill and one is downhill.
I like to ‘anticipate’/plan for my splits based on course terrain, and then hopefully also adding a slight build to negative split. I just write mine on the back of the bib so I can flip it over when I need to look for it. Just did this with a 10 miler recently…starting out a little easy, a little variation in pace for the middle hilly section, then faster splits for the last flat miles. Held to it ‘ok.’
Because the garmin only tells you the last mile. It does not tell you how far off you are compared to where you want to be at that point in the race. If I need to run 7:09 pace, yeah I can see that I’m ahead on this mile and behind on that mile.
Actually the overall average pace display helps me with that. I use it all the time in training. If you want to run your 7:09 pace and you see that your averaging 7:11’s at mile 10, well then I know I’m 20 seconds behind (2 sec per mile over 10 miles). It’s been pretty accurate in my long training runs when I round up.
I see your point. But the band might be a little more helpful on a course like Chicago than a course like Boston. I don’t bands either though
Not sure where it came from but at the boston marathon a girl next to me had a pace band with splits that were calculated for the hills.
You can get terrain graded marathon bands here for many of the big US races.
I know many people will set their watch to autolap at 1.01 miles instead of 1 and use that as their mile pace. Builds in a 3-4 second cushion to count for inaccuracies and missing tangents. Come pretty close I got 26.34 at the end of my last marathon
I know many people will set their watch to autolap at 1.01 miles instead of 1 and use that as their mile pace. Builds in a 3-4 second cushion to count for inaccuracies and missing tangents. Come pretty close I got 26.34 at the end of my last marathon
This is what I do. Because whenever I run a course like Boston or Chicago and manually hit the laps on my Garmin, the watch almost always lists them as 1.01 miles
I know many people will set their watch to autolap at 1.01 miles instead of 1 and use that as their mile pace. Builds in a 3-4 second cushion to count for inaccuracies and missing tangents. Come pretty close I got 26.34 at the end of my last marathon
This is what I do. Because whenever I run a course like Boston or Chicago and manually hit the laps on my Garmin, the watch almost always lists them as 1.01 miles
I should have done this today. My splits would have been much more accurate. Garmin came up with 26.58 miles at the finish. Anyways my 3:08:48 should get me into Boston for 2013 (my Q time is 3:15). BTW the last 10K of marathon can be real painful.
I ran the New York Marathon last week and wore a Garmin Forerunner 110. I too wish I had set my Garmin auto lap for 1.01 mile splits to better account for my actual route.
As the race progressed, my watch would call out each successive mile split a little bit further and further from the actual mile marker. Eventually (due to mental fatigue), I could not rely on my watch to help me calculate my expected finishing time. All I could really do with the information on my watch was see how long I’d been running and what pace I was running for that current mile.
By the way, my Garmin said that I ran 26.34 miles for the race. That GPS distance is probably the typical actual runner’s distance for an accurately marked marathon course.
I find that it is relaxing to do the math in my head. Just did it at the Indy Monumental Marathon. Good practice for the mind!
I like when the math is easy. At wineglass I was aiming for 7:03 miles so I could easily keep track of the seconds to see if I was on pace (my garmin was too far off by mile 6 to be overly useful). I wouldn’t want to have to do the math for 6:48 miles or something like that at mile 23
If you hit the lap button, it resets the mileage (Garmin 404) so that the next mile is accurate with the course measurements. When you are going back through your splits after the race, you need to do some math to get your splits, but it helps during the race itself.