Garmin foot pod

Kkaufer

Used a Garmin foot pod today for the first time during the TM run. I'd heard that apparently TMs are all calibrated differently and one mile on one might not equal one mile on another, yet alone a real mile.  And sure enough, there was a discrepancy in both pace and distance between the footpod and the treadmill. My question is though: how does the footpod know the distance? Because I didn't calibrate it (I can't, because one apparently needs a measured track to calibrate a footpod. i don't have access to a track...) So what does this mean? How can the footpod be accurate? And should I be following what the footpod is telling me (via Garmin 210) or the treadmill with respect to pace and distance? thanks

novaavant

Here is a great article on the footpod that might give you some answers.

http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2011/01/garmin-ant-foot-pods-everything-you.html

Kkaufer

Thanks, I've seen the DCR articles, but for once, I don't understand the details. It's still not clear to me how to manually calibrate the footpod (or if I even need to). I can see on the watch where I can manually change the calibration.  Standard seems to 1000 (whatever that means), but what do I need to change it to, and how do I know?

Gene

I use the garmin footpod with the 910XT.  Somewhere in the menus there is an option to calibrate it.  Then a dropdown menu lets you select between a measures distance or GPS.  I have always calibrated using GPS because I don't have a track near by.  It seems to take about a mile of running to do its thing.

Satish Punna

Dont forget you will have to recalibrate it if you move it on your shoe ie away from or toward the toes, or put it on a different shoe. In my experience the footpod is also most accurate at the speed you calibrate it at, and then accuracy drops off if you go faster or slower.

Tom Glynn

Follow step 3

http://www8.garmin.com/manuals/Forerunner305_FootPodQuickReferenceGuide.pdf?q=foot-pod

Agreed with Satish, calibrate it by running at the speed you most often are at.

If you don't have access to a measured track or known distance, don't lose sleep over it. It's pretty accurate out of the box. Of course calibration makes it better, but it's still pretty darn good and provides useful information. I use it to record treadmill data I wouldn't otherwise get into TrainingPeaks and I use it to monitor cadence.

You can also take it to a local race and use your Garmin. In the DC Rainmaker articles, there is a reference to a free program that looks at GPS data and footpod data and suggests a calibration number. It's PC based. I used it a year or two ago, and it's pretty cool and easy to use. Let me know if you need help finding it.

Dino Sarti

I rarely rely on it for distance. Genrally I use it for cadence. No calibration required. Also, mine is generally really close to the read out on my TM. Just lucky, I guess?

William Jenks

Thought I would add a little experience here that tells you something about the calibration.

In recent weeks, I was taking one of my kids to soccer practice which was occurring on a nice pitch that was surrounded by an equally nice track. (Those poor football schmucks use it when we aren't playing soccer....) Practice was at night, so I just decided to run the track during the time of his practices. Because of the well known problems that Garmin GPS has on track distances, I went ahead and calibrated the GPS at around my HMP and stopped using the GPS at the track. It was extremely accurate from MP though TP. (I didn't really measure it again on slow parts...as I was trying to be able to run on the exterior of the track anyway.) Anyhow, it was great.

Over the last few days, I've been doing a big run volume bump just to build a bit of endurance before I hit the OS in Jan. All runs were outside, except my 5th run in 3 days, which was to be 4 mi steady on an indoor track (late at night). I was pretty stiff and with around 35 mi already under my belt in the previous 60 hours or so, a little tired. The indoor track is marked, and I discovered that the calibration was off by around 4%! In other words, I knew when I had run a mile, and it still said I had 0.04 mi left to go. That's 15-25 sec per mile, depending on how fast you're going!

My point is not that the foot pod is bad...it's great. But it IS sensitive to your gait and you should only really trust it if you calibrate it and "use" it under similar conditions of speed, shoes, treadmill vs. track, etc.