Inexpensive and accurate GPS watchs?

No such thing as an accurate gps watch. Hit and miss depending on where you run, clouds etc. If you have a smart phone, just use mapmyrun. Check the board for prior threads. There have been a few.

I'm not sure about the best model right now, but I think garmin has some for around $140, maybe $120

I've learned to "forget a GPS watch". If you are running a route that requires going under a lot of tree cover/dense foilage, you're better off getting a measuring wheel and measuring the distance yourself. It may involve walking 5 or more miles, but that will encourage you to do a loop path. Its definitely the way to go if you have the patience and you run the same route regularly. Then there won't be any questions.

A bicycle works too if you can get something that converts wheel rotations into distance or that measures th number of times the wheel rotates. Your margin of error would then be +-(circumference of the wheel) since you might not complete a full rotation at the end.

All new Garmin Forerunner 10. Out soon.

The Nike+ GPS watch is not the worst thing to get. It's on the cheaper side of GPS gadgets and accurate enough to count the miles and approx pace on your daily runs or tempos. Better than nothing and whenever time and distance really matters your on the track anyways.

I have a Garmin forerunner 110. $179 or so online. It's within a couple hundredths every day and has been right on on every certified course I've run while wearing it.

I know two people with the Nike GPS- they run with a friend who has the Garmin FR110- they agree within .01 every day.

People who say they aren't accurate are running where the satellites can't pick them (in the woods or even in a major city with a lot of tall buildings) or they just don't know how to use them.

The Nike is about $179

Yes, my gps watch isn't accurate because i don't know how to use it.

Idiot.

An alternative that has no signal loss (dense trees/buildings) to worry about:

http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2010/02/garmin-fr60-review-in-depth.html

The FR70 is the current model.

Dan

405

Or I pray to God

as an earlier poster said...forerunner 10 is out soon and retails for $130...men's version in black and red is supposed to ship 9/28...the pink and green colorways are available a week or two prior to the men's version...

just map out your runs on google earth and save a few hundred dollars

Garmin Forerunner 110 is $147 on Amazon right now. It is simple but extremely functional. It will give you your distance, elapsed time and average pace, and will also function as a watch. It is a lot smaller and lighter than the older Forerunner models. Most of the GPS watches out there do not do a good job with 'instantaneous' pace - and this one doesn't even offer that option.

If you have never used a GPS watch, the biggest issue is not accuracy - most of them are reasonably accurate for a runner, unless you are a total fanatic about hundredths of a mile or something.

The biggest issue for me is the initial start up time, i.e. how long does it take the thing to load satellites and be ready to record your run. It's really frustrating to stand there 5 minutes and wait for it to load. This model is quite fast, usually much less than one minute, sometimes just a couple of seconds if I am in an open area.

The second issue is the ability to hang on to the satellite locks if you are under trees or between buildings in a city or whatever. This little model also seems to do a good job, though I have never tested it some place like New York City.

Third is ease of use, at least for me. This one is simple because it just doesn't have many options. It works fine for my purposes, though. The more expensive 210 will let you record splits, has a heart rate monitor option, etc but I don't need or use those things.

See my link a couple posts up. The Garmin FR60/FR70 does away with all those concerns -- excellent instantaneous pace, virtually no start up time (none if you've been walking around for a few seconds for the footpod to wake up), and no satellite dropout to worry about. Also, much better battery life (a full year on a regular watch battery), full waterproofing, etc. And it maintains most of the high end features despite being priced close to the entry level GPS watches.It's unfortunate that so few people are aware of the non-GPS option. I really think the footpod approach would be a better fit for a lot of people. Once calibrated, accuracy is pretty much a toss-up.Dan

I still us the Garmin Forerunner 205 which can be found for well under $200. Huge, customizable screen, accurate and great battery life.

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dkap wrote:

An alternative that has no signal loss (dense trees/buildings) to worry about:

Dan

My FR60 was uncannily accurate at steady run speeds, but has a disconcerting habit of telling me I am pulling sub 3 miles when I start to do reps and shift to forefoot striking.. They have done an admirable job correcting for terrain but I think the algorithms cannot cope with large ace variations.

Still, impressive value for money...

I'd agree with the FR60. You'll never get anything within less than 2 or 3% accuracy.

Nothing against Garmin, but if you want an alternative, the Timex Ironman GPS Run Trainer is a pretty good one. It's about $190, but I picked it up on sale for $130 during a clearance at REI.

Pros: Durability, battery life, and waterproof (not true of many GPS's)

Cons: Not the most user friendly at first, and a bit on the large side.

I haven't run into that problem with the FR70. I don't know whether there were any changes to it in that respect... It seems to track very smoothly from 5:00 to 9:00 pace (I haven't tested it outside that range), with pace changes quickly reflected.Dan

Eurodonkey wrote:

My FR60 was uncannily accurate at steady run speeds, but has a disconcerting habit of telling me I am pulling sub 3 miles when I start to do reps and shift to forefoot striking.. They have done an admirable job correcting for terrain but I think the algorithms cannot cope with large ace variations.

Still, impressive value for money...

Randy Oldman wrote:

I'd agree with the FR60. You'll never get anything within less than 2 or 3% accuracy.

I'm experimenting with that currently. My initial auto calibration had it recording distance about 1% too high, and thus pace too fast. Before my 5k yesterday (my first race with the watch), I auto re-calibrated over a longer distance and ended up with a factor some 3% lower. In the race, it read mile splits of 0.98, 0.98, and 0.98 (2% low), so very consistent ... the race director measured the course five times by wheel, bike, car, and running watch, and it shows as 3.10 mi by satellite map; I had 3.05 mi overall.

On today's easy long run with the same calibration, it read 3-4% low. Looks like the initial calibration was closer. So, I've bumped it up 1.8% manually, figuring race pace is more important that long run pace feedback, and will keep an eye on the numbers this week. It would appear that 1% accuracy is possible with a bit of trial and error.

Dan