lets talk speed here!

[runner]

thanks iacula
plantar faciitis is one of those nagging complaints....you need to rest not run because running aggravates the arch/rear of the foot. I stopped running for nearly 1 year..and the pf disappeared, used cycling to keep fitness up. Did a few half marathons last year and the prob kept mostly away...however whils't training for my next half marathon on Sunday week the problem returned. I plan to do the race but cycle up to it and then cut down and do a 10k in May....In life most things work better in moderation and most importantly "reading the body" and altering your training to suit

 

[hambones]

My commute is only 7.5 miles and my average speed (including stops/lights/junctions etc) works out at around 18mph. If I take out the first and last mile then it is closer to 20-21!

 

[gavintc]

I take it people don't count their stopped times on their average. When I do an average of 18 mph over 13 miles (including stops) I'm really flying and on a couple of spots hitting nearly 40 mph.

With the Garmin, when you start the clock and record your route, the clock keeps ticking away until you stop it. So, stopping at lights etc all come off the average. What messes up my averages is cycling to meet someone and forgetting to pause (stop and restart) the clock while you get organised to start the run.

 

[HLaB]

With the Garmin, when you start the clock and record your route, the clock keeps ticking away until you stop it. So, stopping at lights etc all come off the average. What messes up my averages is cycling to meet someone and forgetting to pause (stop and restart) the clock while you get organised to start the run.

If you're using it with the speed sensor rather than the gps it actually stops I think you can customise how long it stops for and what speed it stops at below but I've never bothered.

 

[gavintc]

If you're using it with the speed sensor rather than the gps it actually stops I think you can customise how long it stops for and what speed it stops at below but I've never bothered.

Thanks for that - time to spend some more time investigating the detail of my Garmin. It was a Christmas pressie, and to be honest, I am still getting to know it.

 

[HLaB]

Thanks for that - time to spend some more time investigating the detail of my Garmin. It was a Christmas pressie, and to be honest, I am still getting to know it.

With the 305 if you select training, its then autopause. I've had mine nearly a year and I've only just got round to it

 

[jimboalee]

If you have a Garmin.

Go on a short circular ride of about 25 miles.

Connect the Garmin to your PC and it will ( Edge series ) see it as a USB drive.

Change the history file extension to one that MS Excel will recognise. .xml I think ??

Import the file onto an Excel spreadsheet.

Do some Jiggery-pokery. Insert a column and calc the distances between the individual data points.
Time is to the second, so you can calculate the speed for each datapoint.

The AVERAGE() function should agree with Garmin's average speed figure.

The function MEDIAN() will be close to the speed you did 'On the cruise'.

To work and back, my AVERAGE is 16.0mph, but my MEDIAN is 17.8mph. 17.8mph will be the speed I maintained during the majority of my time in motion, and a basis for power consumption calculations and trip timing estimations.
It's NOT strictly true, but is a close enough estimation of my 'Cruising speed' for the trip.

Garmin Users.

Another statistical operator you might want to try.

When you've got your spreadsheet with all the speed values for the datapoints, operate STDEV() ,standard deviation on them.
This will give you a value.
In another column, write a formula which knocks out the speed values if they are below AVERAGE minus 1 StdDev.
Now calculate the MEDIAN for the filtered values.

That's more like it.