My most reliable training partner

I have a training buddy that I need to give some credit to. My Garmin Forerunner has been the sweetest toy I’ve had to play with this year. I picked it up in May, and I’ve hardly done a run or ride without it since.

Here’s a graph from one of my long rides last weekend. (click on it for a more readable image)

You can do all sorts of plots with cadence, heart rate, speed, pace, elevation, you name it. There’s even a weather report for the ride, so you can brag to your friends about 20-30 mph winds on your ride across the Golden Gate.

But unlike other heart rate monitors, it also tells you where you were, can correct elevation errors, and gives run pace while more accurately than any foot pod. Check out a map from that same ride:

Ok, so that’s cool, right? Now check out what I did before Nationals when I was at the course in May (click on the image to see a bigger version, then check out the last 5k. That’s the out and back run course!):

According to the stats from that ride, the 20k loop had over 1000 ft of elevation gain!

Now I can upload that course into a Computrainer, or if I want to revisit the same ride/run next week, I can set it to have me race my virtual self. That way every week I can try to be faster.

I love my Garmin. I’m going to start posting more workout stuff on here, so you can see the whole suite of things that are possible. I’m still finding new stuff to play with on the watch.