No Garmin = PB on regular climb

supermurph09

Hi

Had to drop my malfunctioning Garmin off today so went out for a quick ride with no Garmin to look at it, therefore no Power number, no HR reading and no Cadence data to view as I rode. I recorded the ride on my iphone and was quite shocked to see a PB by 8 seconds on a local climb that I rode hard up today.

I do not believe this improvement in time was brought about by me getting quicker since I last rode the climb, I think maybe not seeing how hard I'm pushing allowed me to go past what I would normally do. With a few Hill Climb events coming up and no doubt without the Garmin for the next week I plan on hitting some other climbs and seeing if I can improve there as well.

I wondered if others had ever found the same, by that I mean riding on feel rather than feedback from a device?

The segment: http://www.strava.com/segments/1326327?filter=overall

danlikesbikes

It's not unheard of & if your in the zone is easy to push a lot more and get into your rhythm

Seem to recall Spartacus saying he preferred to ride TT's on feel alone so guess if it's good enough for a world champ I could a lot worse than following his advice

xscreamsuk

It was an Easterly wind today,

meanredspider

Ha - iPhones are very unreliable. It probably started recording late and stopped recording early due to positional inaccuracies. I only used an iPhone once with Strava and nailed a 20% incline on my commute. It took the racing snakes who are half my age and 2/3rds my weight nearly 6 weeks of trying to finally beat my time. I had fun winding them up in the meantime.

imposter2.0

Different device, different weather, different wind, different day - but apart from that, it was exactly the same...

charlie_potatoes

It was down to the weight saving

An Edge 800 weighs in at 3.45 ounces according to DCRainmaker......

http://www.dcrainmaker.com/2010/08/garmin-edge-800-in-depth-first-look.html

supermurph09

Danlikebikes, you're on the Xmas card list, the rest of you are not! I'll use the Garmin next time but won't display anything useful. I'll show you lot!

meanredspider

meanredspider wrote:

Ha - iPhones are very unreliable. It probably started recording late and stopped recording early due to positional inaccuracies. I only used an iPhone once with Strava and nailed a 20% incline on my commute. It took the racing snakes who are half my age and 2/3rds my weight nearly 6 weeks of trying to finally beat my time. I had fun winding them up in the meantime.

As if to prove that my point at least contributes partly to your result, compare your speed plot (with it's pretty radical spikes and dips) with the speed plot of the KoM (who records temperature so is probably a Garmin Edge or similar) and is comparatively silky-smooth. That just shows that the positional accuracy is poor.

dw300

iPhone gives faster times compared to Garmins. You probably went slower. Especially if you left your wifi on.

supermurph09

meanredspider wrote:

meanredspider wrote:

Ha - iPhones are very unreliable. It probably started recording late and stopped recording early due to positional inaccuracies. I only used an iPhone once with Strava and nailed a 20% incline on my commute. It took the racing snakes who are half my age and 2/3rds my weight nearly 6 weeks of trying to finally beat my time. I had fun winding them up in the meantime.

As if to prove that my point at least contributes partly to your result, compare your speed plot (with it's pretty radical spikes and dips) with the speed plot of the KoM (who records temperature so is probably a Garmin Edge or similar) and is comparatively silky-smooth. That just shows that the positional accuracy is poor.

Its the final part of the segment that's bizarre, I lost about 8 seconds in about 30 metres, not a chance that happened.

timdb

Supermurph09 wrote:

Its the final part of the segment that's bizarre, I lost about 8 seconds in about 30 metres, not a chance that happened.

Just as the iPhone can position you wrongly to put you ahead (on the first part), it can position you wrongly to make you look slow (on the end part). In this instance the errors all stacked up to give you a good overall time.
Don't worry about it, just use the iPhone time as a target to beat next time you're out with the Garmin..

Cluelessbutkeen

I use Strava on iPhone for and I think it's safest to treat the results as indicative only. I can do EXACTLY the same ride three times in a row and get three different distances, ranging from 20.1 miles to 20.8 miles. If you ever zoom into a segment on the iPhone you'll see the tracking is often way off.

You don't say how long the segment is but personally I generally 'hide' any segments shorter than four or five minutes' duration as the accuracy on those is likely to be very suspect. And eight seconds would be easily within the margin for error on any length of segment.

Your Garmin is using GPS, whereas the iPhone is often attempting to triangulate its position using mobile phone towers.

frisbee

Cluelessbutkeen wrote:

I use Strava on iPhone for and I think it's safest to treat the results as indicative only. I can do EXACTLY the same ride three times in a row and get three different distances, ranging from 20.1 miles to 20.8 miles. If you ever zoom into a segment on the iPhone you'll see the tracking is often way off.

You don't say how long the segment is but personally I 'hide' any segments shorter than three or four minutes' duration as the accuracy on those is likely to be very suspect.

Your Garmin is using GPS, whereas the iPhone is attempting to triangulate its position using mobile phone towers.

All smartphones have GPS.

My iphone seems to log my rides absolutely fine, I get very little variance on my regular commute.

However, some android device look noticeably more accurate than either iphones or Garmins.

Cluelessbutkeen

All smartphones have GPS.

You're right. But mobile phones will resort to using towers ('assisted GPS') when the signal is poor. Anyway, there is this extract on reasons why strava can be inaccurate:

https://strava.zendesk.com/entries/2144 ... naccurate-

Perhaps your commute is in an area with a strong GPS signal.

I regularly have 'missing' segments on my rides. It can be a segment I have ridden 10 times before, but on the 11th ride, strava will plot my route a little differently and refuse to assign it to the segment. And conversely there are some segments I can only trigger on one ride out of ten.

And then there are the rides where strava just gives up and draws a straight line between wherever it lost the GPS signal and wherever it next picks it up.

I love Strava on iPhone, but it is flaky.

Karla

A very entertaining thread.

Never nave these problems with my watch timing climbs from and to known markers at the start and finish.

With regard to how a rider might respond to seeing power etc on a display, it probably depends on the rider. Some riders who have an inability to pace by will benefit from seeing the numbers, but my personal opinion is that one should learn how to pace without the aid of gadgets.

Cluelessbutkeen

This is classic strava on the iPhone. And no, I did not do an Armstrong and ride across the field

It's a fun app and a good way to record overall distances and overall pace, but for shorter segments, you have to take the timings with a large pinch of salt.

But to the OP's original question - it still might be a PB. There's just no way of knowing!

BrandonA

frisbee wrote:

Cluelessbutkeen wrote:

However, some android device look noticeably more accurate than Garmins.

I can't imagine that is true.

frisbee

BrandonA wrote:

frisbee wrote:

Cluelessbutkeen wrote:

However, some android device look noticeably more accurate than Garmins.

I can't imagine that is true.

I bookmarked this post to investigate further.

http://www.bikeradar.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=40088&t=12867807&start=780#p19049022

My half thoughts about getting a Garmin are on hold until I have.

In theory with all the accelerometers, gyros and magnetometers and the cell tower and wifi triangulation smart phones should be really accurate.

sloppyschleckonds

Strava? Personal Bests? Iphone?

I'm out.

ozzzyosborn206

I used to race with power on the screen, then was advised not to as if you see high numbers it could crack you, so i have changed my 'race screen' to not have power displayed, first big race i did with it, i rode a climb mid race chasing a break at 400 watts, then later attacked on same climb dropping the group and bridging across to the lone leader. Had I had power on the screen I wouldn't have ridden at 400 watts on the climb mid race as i wouldn't have expected to have good legs later on in the race but it did me no harm and helped close the gap down.

supermurph09

Still not got my Garmin back yet so been riding on feel with the iphone in the back pocket. I believe the accuracy but it will be nice to get the Garmin back to confirm. One thing I will not be showing on my screen is Heart Rate. I believe the biggest benefit I've seen in the last week without the Garmin is not seeing my HR. I believe this has been subconsciously limiting how hard I can push.

jgarpotter

I really am not a fan of using a phone, I seem to feel I'm going much slow when I don't have a speedo of sorts (even if I'm not), and it doesn't help push me at all. Plus when this happens going up Winnats pass its an incredibly frustrating device to use..!

http://puu.sh/bFqJ4/6b1c40acd1.png