My Garmin lied to me!

zornig
zornig Posts: 336 Member
I did a triathlon training brick this morning: 10 miles on the bike followed by a 5K, for time. It's windy here this morning so my bike time was not as good as I'd have liked (plus I've not been spending enough time on the bike) but I felt strong going into the run. According to my Garmin I was running an 8:30 minute mile for the first mile, and before I knew it, Garmin was telling me I'd finished my 5K in 19:39. That is a full 10 minutes faster than my PR and I knew it just couldn't be true. Plus it felt like I hadn't been running long enough! So for good measure, I ran one more mile. When I got home and checked the Garmin against Gmap-pedometer, I discovered that where Garmin was telling me I'd hit 3.1 miles, I'd in fact only hit 2.1 miles! Good thing I ran that extra mile. Still managed to do the 5K in less than 30 minutes, so I'm satisfied.

Has this ever happened to anyone with their Garmin before? I use the 910T.

Replies

  • davemunger
    davemunger Posts: 1,139 Member
    I have had my Garmin completely twit out on me a couple times. It seems to happen for just a single run -- it's like it has gone completely haywire. One time it said I was running a 5:00 mile pace, uphill -- something I've never done under any conditions. Then I looked at the map afterwards and it had me in a completely different county from where I was running.
  • lorierin22
    lorierin22 Posts: 432 Member
    Oh no! Please don't tell me this...lol! I got my garmin because my nike plus app was so unreliable. If it was cloudy at all it would tell me I had done 7 miles when I knew it was only 3 (yes it was that bad!). My garmin hasn't lied to me yet, but I haven't had it very long so I'm hoping that day doesn't come. I know nothing is 100% but I've been counting on my garmin to be pretty accurate. Like you said...at least YOU knew and you got in your full 5K!
  • davemunger
    davemunger Posts: 1,139 Member
    Oh no! Please don't tell me this...lol! I got my garmin because my nike plus app was so unreliable. If it was cloudy at all it would tell me I had done 7 miles when I knew it was only 3 (yes it was that bad!). My garmin hasn't lied to me yet, but I haven't had it very long so I'm hoping that day doesn't come. I know nothing is 100% but I've been counting on my garmin to be pretty accurate. Like you said...at least YOU knew and you got in your full 5K!

    I have recorded over 600 activities on my Garmin and I can count on one hand the number of times it has messed up my running data. It's completely freaked out a couple of times, but the other thing it does sometimes is generates a "corrupt" file, which won't upload to Garmin Connect or display information like lap times on the watch. It actually happened to me this past weekend during a long trail race. The numbers were accurate while I was running, but afterwards I couldn't upload the data. Very frustrating, but at least I had the information I needed while I was racing!
  • zornig
    zornig Posts: 336 Member
    By and large I've had very good experiences with Garmin (first the 210 and now the 910T). I can't really explain how it happened--perhaps because I didn't do a full reset between the bike and the run, but only changed activities? Oh well, I hope it doesn't happen again!