As much as I've always loved swimming, and biking [both road and mountain], I've always has a distaste for running. It's just.....boring. Unlike swimming, and cycling, I have to run with music, something that I probably shouldn't be in the habit of doing, but it's just not as much fun as the other two for me, and thus I need something to distract me. This is the way it's been for years. I know a lot of people out there really love running, but for whatever reason it just never really caught on for me.
However, last night I was over at a friends house for small group, and one of the guys in our group who is an avid runner was showing us his new running watch that he had to get as a replacement for his old one. My friend Joe then said something along the lines of "Hey, I think I have that same one." So Joe dug around in a drawer for a minute and pulled out a plastic bag with the watch and all of it's pieces. He promptly held it up and said "know of anyone who would want to buy it?" I said I had a friend who might be interested in it, so Joe tossed me the watch and I started taking a look at it. After a minute of inspection, I looked up and said "you know what, I think I might want to buy it instead." So Joe told me I could take it home, use it, and let him know.
The watch was completely dead since it hadn't been used in quite some time, so I came home last night and started charging it up, while hopping online to look at all the brief training videos Garmin has for it. I fiddled with the settings all morning long, trying to learn my around the features and menus. [It has A LOT, probably more than I need at this time.] So fast forward to this afternoon, I came home, put on the heart rate monitor [never used one of those before], and headed out for a little run, a loop that I like to do when the mood for a run strikes. I let the watch acquire its location with the satellites, and I was off. The run was a regular old run, nothing different than I normally do. It's what came after the run that was cool.
The watch will automatically and wirelessly sync with your computer when you get a couple feet away. So as soon as I got back home and into my room, the watch lit up and started transferring the run data to my computer. I set up an account on the Garmin Connect website to keep track of all my activities. And it was automatically uploaded to the website. Pretty cool...and easy! Anyways, getting to the point of this whole post...it will also allow you to share and embed a brief summary of your workout. You can see some of the basic information below, or you can click on 'view details' and it should show you a more in depth analysis of my run including heart rates, lap times, pace, etc, etc.
Having the watch and website automatically do all this work for me is pretty cool. It's a really simple way to have everything tracked and recorded for you. I know I've only scratched the surface of what this thing is capable of, but so far I really like it. Also, it can work for your bike as well, so I'll need to pick up the bike mounts and accessories soon. Hopefully this new little toy will help keep me motivated to run more often, farther, and faster. I'll make sure to post updates on how things are going, or if I happen to complete some crazy workout. Wish me luck!
No comments:
Post a Comment