Forums >Gears and Wears>"In GPS We Trust"
Imminent Catastrophe
Next time you're in a large race, listen for the beeps at the even miles. A lot of runners set them to beep every mile, and you can hear how everyone's GPS differs by where they beep. There's usually a fairly large difference between the first and last "mile" beep, and it increases as the race goes on. Besides that, it's kind of annoying.
"Able to function despite imminent catastrophe"
"To obtain the air that angels breathe you must come to Tahoe"--Mark Twain
"The most common question from potential entrants is 'I do not know if I can do this' to which I usually answer, 'that's the whole point'.--Paul Charteris, Tarawera Ultramarathon RD.
√ Javelina Jundred Jalloween 2015
Cruel Jewel 50 mile May 2016
Western States 100 June 2016
It seems we are all in agreement that the GPS worked the way it was supposed to work and the course was measured accurately. This means the runner should actually sue the other runners for not allowing him to run the tangents (or perhaps his geometry teacher).
Thank you for taking the time to read my signature!
There's a Maniac who developed an "I'm gonna sue!" reputation over the past year. Perhaps I should point him at this thread.
Wait. No. That would be bad. He is somewhat entertaining, though. Sort of.
Best Present Ever
I'm ready to sue Garmin. I'm fine with knowing that my garmin is an approximate measure of my distance and speed when I run. I am annoyed, however, that when the battery died in my forerunner 205 back in December, I elected to pay $69+ shipping to get a refurb rather than buy a new one. My refurb has a significant problem obtaining the satellite (it took me 25 minutes on Tuesday, when I was running from home) and it frequently drops the satellite during my run. Last Saturday, it told me I was running a 10:45 pace for a bit. I was briefly discouraged until I realized it was giving me bad data. It then flashed that it had lost the satellite, then regained the satellite connection and decided I was running a 7 min mile pace. I was probably running about an 8 mm pace. Garmin will only give me another refurb rather than refunding my money, but 1) I don't want another refurb and 2) I don't want to be without the garmin for the 2-3 weeks it will take to return and receive the new unit. No point to this, except to warn folks away from the refurbished option. I wish I'd take 60 seconds to comparison shop online. I didn't realize until I'd already paid Garmin that I could have gotten a new model for about $115 and free shipping. What I have right now, to tie to topic, is option 4: neither precise nor accurate.
Stolen from the competitor.nashville site who stole it too. I think the picture posted by jeffgoblue and this fairly well explain the differences. Ask Garmin: Who’s right? Forerunner or the race course? April 7, 2008 – posted in Ask Garmin, Into Sports, Jake’s Journal, On the Trail, Peg’s Posts, A Forerunner customer who recently ran the Shamrock Shuffle 8k in Chicago asked us why the distance shown on her Forerunner varied from the official race distance of 5 miles … or 4.9709695379 if you want to be ultra precise. If the distance shown on your Forerunner is slightly more than the official race distance, it just means you weren’t cutting corners—quite literally. According to the IAAF (International Association of Athletics Federation) course measurement guidelines (pg. 20), a road race course is defined by the shortest possible route a runner could take without being disqualified. For most races, a certified measurer rides the course on a bike, staying near the curb and taking every available tangent. This ensures that all runners will run at least the declared race distance. After the race, if Forerunner shows that you ran a little farther, this just accounts for extra steps you took to run around others participants, hit a water stop or stay to the middle or outside lane. Read more: http://nashville.competitor.com/event-info/course/#ixzz1HR9CdpW2
Stolen from the competitor.nashville site who stole it too.
I think the picture posted by jeffgoblue and this fairly well explain the differences.
April 7, 2008 – posted in Ask Garmin, Into Sports, Jake’s Journal, On the Trail, Peg’s Posts,
A Forerunner customer who recently ran the Shamrock Shuffle 8k in Chicago asked us why the distance shown on her Forerunner varied from the official race distance of 5 miles … or 4.9709695379 if you want to be ultra precise.
If the distance shown on your Forerunner is slightly more than the official race distance, it just means you weren’t cutting corners—quite literally. According to the IAAF (International Association of Athletics Federation) course measurement guidelines (pg. 20), a road race course is defined by the shortest possible route a runner could take without being disqualified. For most races, a certified measurer rides the course on a bike, staying near the curb and taking every available tangent. This ensures that all runners will run at least the declared race distance.
After the race, if Forerunner shows that you ran a little farther, this just accounts for extra steps you took to run around others participants, hit a water stop or stay to the middle or outside lane.
Read more: http://nashville.competitor.com/event-info/course/#ixzz1HR9CdpW2
Nice spin. Blame the runner for not following tangents instead of acknowledging that GPS devices aren't precise.
Anybody who is pacing by Garmin expecting it to measure distance precisely just doesn't get it.
BUT. Garmins are still incredibly useful for pacing in a race. Just use average lap pace to keep at about the pace you want for this mile/km, check your actual splits each mile, and adjust. Because the Garmin will tend to measure a bit long, you want the Garmin average lap readout to be a few seconds faster than your goal this lap. And be sure to turn off autolap!
The real problem here is not in mismeasured courses, but in badly misplaced mile/km markers, which is much more common. Unless you know they are accurately placed, then you can't reliably use the above method, and you have to go by Garmin the whole way, pacing faster than your goal to compensate for your guessed Garmin excess (~ 1%). When you're not sure about the mile markers is the worst. Do I trust that the markers will even out? Or is tracking them just going to cause me lots of angst?
Couple months ago I ran a half where I took the mile markers as ground truth. I should have been suspicious; every one was bang on my Garmin's measurement, so at M12 I was at 12.01. The finish line was at 13.2+, so I was ~40 seconds over my goal. Yeah, I was annoyed.
Options,Account, Forums
... What I have right now, to tie to topic, is option 4: neither precise nor accurate.
But you also have painfully slow signal pickup, and signal dropping, which the original graphic didn't even cover, so that's a double bonus.
It's a 5k. It hurt like hell...then I tried to pick it up. The end.
an amazing likeness
This I believe:
* We (the big global we, not the local RA we) would have something like 1/10th the conversation about this if Garmin had simply chosen to have the display be only the first decimal.
* There should be be 10,000 times more wonderment at the fact that a device exists which is small enough to fit on your wrist, works in all kinds of weather, while you're madly swinging your arms, which can tell the time difference between radio signals from different satellites and use that to calculate distance that is really accurate.
Acceptable at a dance, invaluable in a shipwreck.
Both seattle marathons (original recipe and rock n roll) utilize tunnels.
GPS does interesting things.
I love it when people complain about the course because 1) the tunnels 2) messed up their garmins.
Anyway, both of those courses would be hella harder if one of those tunnels wasn't there (Seattle rnr also has a *second* tunnel... Battery Street... that you do twice... this one is debatable on whether the course would be harder or easier without it). And running through a tunnel is kinda cool.
It would be MORE cool if RnR didn't put a band in one. Loud rock band in a tunnel. GAH. I'm too old for that shit.
rectumdamnnearkilledem
This.
Getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to
remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air.
~ Sarah Kay
I'm going to go with only 6,500 more wonderment at all of that.
My (I assume now lemon) 310xt will sit there and pump out the distance when I'm standing still. I could create a mockup fake device to do that.
Bonus: ANT stick.
"During a marathon, I run about two-thirds of the time. That's plenty." - Margaret Davis, 85 Ed Whitlock regarding his 2:54:48 marathon at age 73, "That was a good day. It was never a struggle."
Thanks zoomy, that was hilarious!
He's my favorite comedian. Most of his bits make me laugh so hard I end up with tears down my face.
Were you using instantaneous pace? Because even a perfectly good GPS will be useless for displaying that. The best you can do is lap pace. If you want a laugh, set it to display altitude or %grade and watch it go crazy.
Hahahaha that was good!!! And so true as well! I'm a piano teacher, and I get kids saying to me, "Oh, I hate to practice. I'd rather be on the computer." When I tell them at their age I didn't know what a computer was, let alone have 24/7 access to one, they look at me with their mouths and eyes wide open.
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