Running with a Garmin Forerunner GPS

On or about 2/20/07 6:36 AM, thus spake "Wolfgang Berberich"
<berbiemac.com>:

> Regarding this article on TidBITS I'd take the opportunity to
> announce a freeware alternative, or more a extension, to Garmin Training
> Center
> for MacOS X. Anyone who is interested is invited to give TrailRunner
> a try.

> http://www.trailrunnerx.com

As a user, I'd like to add that this is a Really Cool Program. I use it to
make up for the *lack* of a GPS: it tells me the lengths of my running
routes. m.

--
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Matt Neuburg wrote:
> On or about 2/20/07 6:36 AM, thus spake "Wolfgang Berberich"
> <berbiemac.com>:
>
>> Regarding this article on TidBITS I'd take the opportunity to
>> announce a freeware alternative, or more a extension, to Garmin Training
>> Center
>> for MacOS X. Anyone who is interested is invited to give TrailRunner
>> a try.
>
>> http://www.trailrunnerx.com
>
> As a user, I'd like to add that this is a Really Cool Program. I use it to
> make up for the *lack* of a GPS: it tells me the lengths of my running
> routes. m.

I've been trying out the successive versions of TrailRunner since I
first learned about it from VersionTracker, well before I got a GPS.
I've played around with it occasionally, more so after I got my Garmin
GPSmap 60CSx. I've tried out several different programs to interact
with the GPS, and none of them are without their quirks and annoyances.
 For example, when I open a GPX track log in TrailRunner, it shows the
correct time and distance, but once imported, it loses the correct time,
since it uses the estimate of my average speed from the preferences to
compute the time from the distance. This may have some use when
planning a route, but it's simply wrong post facto. Data should
override estimates. Since I do both road and mountain biking and cross
country skiing (with an occasional hike thrown in), there's no one
average speed that I could put in anyway. Even for road cycling, the 17
mph average I put in is correct for mid-summer road cycling, but when I
get out in a few weeks time for the first time I'll be lucky to stay in
the 15's what with the extra clothing and colder air.

So once I get a track in and the maps loaded into TrailRunner, the times
are wrong, and in any event, there doesn't seem to be much you can do
with it. It'd be nice if you could click on a point on the track and
have it show you things like elevation, speed, or cumulative distance at
that point. Even cooler would be a Google Earth like "replay the track"
feature. (Maybe it does all this, but I haven't found out just by
playing around with it.) I agree it's a Really Cool Program, but I
haven't really figured out how to make it useful to me. Part of that is
undoubtedly that I haven't had the time yet to sit down with it and read
through the documentation.

The program I use most often is MacGPS Pro (http://www.macgpspro.com/).
 Most of the annoyances there are UI problems; using it is like using a
program on my first 512k Mac. The scroll wheel and extra buttons on my
mouse do nothing, the arrow keys and page up/page down do nothing. You
must use the scroll bars to move around. I'm always setting the track
lines to wide (they're hard to see otherwise) from the pull down menu
(no preference to set it that way automatically, and no way to change
the color used for the track). On the other hand, it allows you to see
speeds, distances, and altitudes along the track, including creating an
altitude profile plot, and can handle multiple maps and tracks, so it's
quite useful, but it does have an annoying UI. It also takes much
longer than TrailRunner or Google Earth to download a track from the GPS.

I use Google Earth to "replay" tracks, which is fun. But Google Earth
doesn't seem to take any notice of time information (replaying a track
is at a constant speed, so you go as fast climbing a mountain as
descending it).

There's a new program I became aware of just recently called Ascent
(http://www.montebellosoftware.com/). The Quicktime demo I saw at their
web site is really nice, but it won't communicate with the 60CSx, and it
won't read GPX files in demo mode. So I'm still looking for a single
"killer app" to use with the GPS.
--
Paul Schinder
schinderpobox.com

Paul Schinder wrote:
>
> There's a new program I became aware of just recently called Ascent
> (http://www.montebellosoftware.com/). The Quicktime demo I saw at their
> web site is really nice, but it won't communicate with the 60CSx, and it
> won't read GPX files in demo mode. So I'm still looking for a single
> "killer app" to use with the GPS.


Just as an addendum to this, after I wrote this I learned on the Yahoo
macmap list that the Ascent demo had been changed so it would read a
limited number of GPX files. I downloaded the new demo, loaded a GPX,
and 5 minutes later was purchasing a key from Kagi. I think I found my
killer app. There are a few things that could be better (it could
include "XC skiing" as an activity or let the user have control of the
list, and let the equipment list be user settable; I have two road bikes
and I like to keep track of rides according to bike, not category. It'd
also be neat if it downloaded the weather information from somewhere
rather than having to enter it). All in all, though, it's a Really Cool
Program.

--
Paul Schinder
schinderpobox.com

I'll put in a vote for IB Runners Log ( http://www.iridiumblue.com/pages/prod-IBRL.shtml )

It is a very elegant Cocoa program which at this stage is restricted to dealing with serial-based (i.e. currently not USB) Garmin GPS units, in particular the ForeRunner 201 and 301.

It allows you to keep track of your running/cycling etc, plot maps and display them in Google Earth, and has a nice set of statistical graphs to allow you to track cumulative distances run, average pace, number of runs per month, etc. One nice feature allows you to keep track of distances each pair of shoes has been used. Clearly developed by a keen runner.

It is a capable, simple and beautifully executed program which I'd recommend to anyone with a ForeRunner. The demo runs for 60 days and is fully functional. Sometimes you might find that your runs seem to have disappeared though: that is solved by pushing a button to re-generate the demo licence. A new version is due out soon. I haven't tried out TrailRunner so can't compare it.