good luck with that Andy :-)
I have mixed feelings on this. I really prefer to plan my rides by old fashioned map reading. I like to plan routes on map my ride using google. I am grateful for the mileage calculations and the climb specs gradient and length categorized.
I have on several occasions been grateful for others with garmins to help sort a route when not certain of a turn on route.
I don't however feel they are necessary for most of a ride as I have mentally logged the route and therefore have a good feel for the direction and points to look out for on the way.
I see them as a point of reference at intervals on route to clarify rather than dominate. I see no need to constantly goggle at them if one has planned a route the old fashioned way.
I usually write down distance between key points, note the villages and key turns/directions,and carry a small map of the route printed out. I used to carry enlarged maps of difficult sections for reference.
All this has to some extent been out dated by the garmin but I still prefer it to looking at a tiny screen.
As for being disruptive to a good riding experience I tend to agree with you Andy.
Indeed ... I showed a 'young' person my AtoZ London yesterday on the way to a meeting. Utter incomprehension! Having a 'smart' phone was a big step for me, enabling maps/location is years away yet, if ever. Exercising your brain (by knowing where you are, reading a map and finding your way home) is just as important as exercising your muscles.
I got the 520 to pick up power meter output to send to my coach, not for maps or to turn cycling into an online, (anti)-social-media video game.
Andy, it sounds like you haven't spent much time with many young people recently. Lots of young people know how to use maps, in fact they're still taught how to do that at school, I do believe. Is it as easy to use as google maps which will spoon feed you a route? No. Will that route be the best route? possibly not. You might not be able to see all those swings and roundabouts on that route...
Using a garmin to pair with a power meter to make you go faster on a bike is a brilliant use of modern technology in this sport and a great way to train. You'd be hard pushed to find anybody who's trained properly with it who will say otherwise. It's a sound investment and (with or without power) I'm sure you'll smash your PB over a 10 this year, you're looking pretty speedy and with a bit of know how you can't fail to go faster.
Strava? It's nice to see what other people are up to! Especially if you're racing against them and know they've had a good winter's worth of training... It's easy to delete rides off there if you don't want people to see. Use it how you want to use it, that's the joy of it. Is it nice coming home and seeing you've got a KOM? Yup. Does it really matter when Mitchy nicks it off you on one of his training rides? Nope. I know that on some of my regular routes it's helped me push a little bit harder than I would have managed on an effort... People that go around hunting KOMs? Up to them, isn't it? People who go chasing KOMs on club runs? well, they probably don't know what a mudguard is, let alone a flap. I think most people know my views on that.
It depends on your cycling priorities I guess, I train to race road races and time trials and couldn't care less about KOMs (especially since Mitchy started stealing them all). Some people train to get KOMs, some people train to ride sportives, some people love a bit of audax/track/grass track/CX/BMX/MTB/touring etc etc and we're lucky that we have loads of people in our club that do a bit of most of these things. It's all riding a bike, isn't it?
Does Strava ruin your marriage? If you spend too much time on your bike, yeah, but you don't need to have Strava to do that, bicycles have been ruining marriages for years!
You're waaaay too earnest Will, I'm just being silly, but also pointing out a few of the dangerous and anti-social aspects of Garmins that the considerate person would do well to be aware of.
Having said that, I have indeed bought a Garmin! Woop woop! I won't be setting up on Strava anytime soon though. TEHO, but not for me.
I bought it for exactly the reason Will perfectly described: to collect, and train with, power data. On club runs, I'll collect said data with the Garmin in my pocket though, with my focus on road safety and taking the mickey out of my club mates. And MOST importantly ... I'll be turning off the electronic noise pollution.
Absolutely Mr Danckert ... might be calling upon your expertise for a bit of help in that regard. I completely get all the training concepts and just how fabby it all is, but more on the practical side of collecting, organising and uploading data ... that side is all a bit new.
The rest is just a bit of a windup of people who a) look at their Garmins and crash (which is at least entertaining as long as they don't hurt themselves too badly), and b) leave the sound on, and thus ruin MY ride (grrr!) with the noise and thus condemn themselves to a special room in Hades next to people who talk loudly on their mobiles on trains, or leave their keypad tones on ...
Garmin, Strava, paper maps all have their place and everyone has their preferred way of using them
Think we're all still learning how best to use the newer technologies (I've got a vague memory of Will being a Strava-denier until last year, so there's no telling who will be the next convert) ... and as with anything new, we have to learn where they fit into the sport we love and how not to offend our fellow riders. IMO if somebody does something on a club ride that's dangerous, or breaches club-run etiquette, or annoys you, it's your job to let them know. Just be polite, be constructive and know that they probably wouldn't be doing it, if they realised how it made other club members feel
BTW if you chase Strava segments on a club ride, you will piss me off if you don't do any work on the front and then try to beast your 'friends' when the group gets to a climb. Or brag about being better than another CCA member because Strava says so. (If Strava were that clever at judging ability, then I'm a stronger climber than Marianne Vos, which clearly I am not)
My Garmin Edge has stopped working several times, mid-ride (most annoyingly, on the Fred Whitton) so I don't rely on it 100%. Road signs and paper maps and asking the locals are more reliable and IMO, more fun. It was a joy to ride a reliability trial last weekend, in which we followed neon arrows in the hedges, rather than lines on a small screen. Treasure hunt styley
On the plus side, Garmin was brilliant in Mallorca, the Alps and Lanzarote for navigation - just needed to download maps (for free) beforehand. And my Edge came with cadence and heart rate monitoring, which is all anyone needs for training until/unless you get to the stage of wanting power data too
After considerable soul-searching, the 520 has been returned to the retailer, box unopened.
I just can't bring myself to put it on the bike. I've no doubt that training with power is a "superior" way to train. And I'm not immune to the attraction of the various online communities and tools available to those with Garmins and power meters, but I'm going to avert my attention from the digitisation of cycling and just ride bikes.
This is just me though. Please rest assured that despite my tongue-in-cheek wind-ups above, I'm not judging anyone's else's use and enjoyment of those things. No doubt they are useful, compelling and fun for many lovely people that I like and care about. They're just not for me.
Thanks GG! I feel like a teenager who's been offered a Class-A for the first time (c'mon, everyone's doing it, it's cool) and had the good sense to refuse.
I think it is good that everyone is trying to improve and that we have some good racers in the club. But let's be honest with ourselves. We are not going to be pro. cyclists and if we don't win the hill climb, or TT or cyclocross or closed circuit, or whatever it isn't going to spoil cycling for us.
Staying fit, being able to ride at a good pace with others on a hard or tricky ride, having the endurance to ride day after day in tough terrain with clubmates and still have a laugh and good company afterwards is far more important than putting yourself through the shredding machine of training for the last degree of performance and then still getting slaughtered in an event by someone who is better than you or dare I say on performance enhancing drugs or with a motorized bike. It really isn't that important.
Whatever does it for you to enjoy cycling then go for it but don't feel compelled to do or try anything just to be part of the trend.
Comments
I have mixed feelings on this. I really prefer to plan my rides by old fashioned map reading. I like to plan routes on map my ride using google. I am grateful for the mileage calculations and the climb specs gradient and length categorized.
I have on several occasions been grateful for others with garmins to help sort a route when not certain of a turn on route.
I don't however feel they are necessary for most of a ride as I have mentally logged the route and therefore have a good feel for the direction and points to look out for on the way.
I see them as a point of reference at intervals on route to clarify rather than dominate. I see no need to constantly goggle at them if one has planned a route the old fashioned way.
I usually write down distance between key points, note the villages and key turns/directions,and carry a small map of the route printed out. I used to carry enlarged maps of difficult sections for reference.
All this has to some extent been out dated by the garmin but I still prefer it to looking at a tiny screen.
As for being disruptive to a good riding experience I tend to agree with you Andy.
I got the 520 to pick up power meter output to send to my coach, not for maps or to turn cycling into an online, (anti)-social-media video game.
Is it anti-social? Academic PROOF that it is!
Is it EATING cycling's soul?
Using a garmin to pair with a power meter to make you go faster on a bike is a brilliant use of modern technology in this sport and a great way to train. You'd be hard pushed to find anybody who's trained properly with it who will say otherwise. It's a sound investment and (with or without power) I'm sure you'll smash your PB over a 10 this year, you're looking pretty speedy and with a bit of know how you can't fail to go faster.
Strava? It's nice to see what other people are up to! Especially if you're racing against them and know they've had a good winter's worth of training... It's easy to delete rides off there if you don't want people to see. Use it how you want to use it, that's the joy of it. Is it nice coming home and seeing you've got a KOM? Yup. Does it really matter when Mitchy nicks it off you on one of his training rides? Nope. I know that on some of my regular routes it's helped me push a little bit harder than I would have managed on an effort... People that go around hunting KOMs? Up to them, isn't it? People who go chasing KOMs on club runs? well, they probably don't know what a mudguard is, let alone a flap. I think most people know my views on that.
It depends on your cycling priorities I guess, I train to race road races and time trials and couldn't care less about KOMs (especially since Mitchy started stealing them all). Some people train to get KOMs, some people train to ride sportives, some people love a bit of audax/track/grass track/CX/BMX/MTB/touring etc etc and we're lucky that we have loads of people in our club that do a bit of most of these things. It's all riding a bike, isn't it?
Does Strava ruin your marriage? If you spend too much time on your bike, yeah, but you don't need to have Strava to do that, bicycles have been ruining marriages for years!
Interesting
Having said that, I have indeed bought a Garmin! Woop woop! I won't be setting up on Strava anytime soon though. TEHO, but not for me.
I bought it for exactly the reason Will perfectly described: to collect, and train with, power data. On club runs, I'll collect said data with the Garmin in my pocket though, with my focus on road safety and taking the mickey out of my club mates. And MOST importantly ... I'll be turning off the electronic noise pollution.
I've got one volunteer ready to help me learn how to use mine (currently being installed by Ashwell's BEST mech, Mr. Richard Maynard), thanks!
And turns people into self-obsessed narcissists ...
And a "not very nice person" ...
I hope Richard isn't charging much for the install. Surely it's just a quarter turn and then stand outside.....
The rest is just a bit of a windup of people who a) look at their Garmins and crash (which is at least entertaining as long as they don't hurt themselves too badly), and b) leave the sound on, and thus ruin MY ride (grrr!) with the noise and thus condemn themselves to a special room in Hades next to people who talk loudly on their mobiles on trains, or leave their keypad tones on ...
Richard's services are always a bargain!
Just a thought
Pete2
Think we're all still learning how best to use the newer technologies (I've got a vague memory of Will being a Strava-denier until last year, so there's no telling who will be the next convert) ... and as with anything new, we have to learn where they fit into the sport we love and how not to offend our fellow riders. IMO if somebody does something on a club ride that's dangerous, or breaches club-run etiquette, or annoys you, it's your job to let them know. Just be polite, be constructive and know that they probably wouldn't be doing it, if they realised how it made other club members feel
BTW if you chase Strava segments on a club ride, you will piss me off if you don't do any work on the front and then try to beast your 'friends' when the group gets to a climb. Or brag about being better than another CCA member because Strava says so. (If Strava were that clever at judging ability, then I'm a stronger climber than Marianne Vos, which clearly I am not)
My Garmin Edge has stopped working several times, mid-ride (most annoyingly, on the Fred Whitton) so I don't rely on it 100%. Road signs and paper maps and asking the locals are more reliable and IMO, more fun. It was a joy to ride a reliability trial last weekend, in which we followed neon arrows in the hedges, rather than lines on a small screen. Treasure hunt styley
On the plus side, Garmin was brilliant in Mallorca, the Alps and Lanzarote for navigation - just needed to download maps (for free) beforehand. And my Edge came with cadence and heart rate monitoring, which is all anyone needs for training until/unless you get to the stage of wanting power data too
I just can't bring myself to put it on the bike. I've no doubt that training with power is a "superior" way to train. And I'm not immune to the attraction of the various online communities and tools available to those with Garmins and power meters, but I'm going to avert my attention from the digitisation of cycling and just ride bikes.
This is just me though. Please rest assured that despite my tongue-in-cheek wind-ups above, I'm not judging anyone's else's use and enjoyment of those things. No doubt they are useful, compelling and fun for many lovely people that I like and care about. They're just not for me.
Close call ...
Staying fit, being able to ride at a good pace with others on a hard or tricky ride, having the endurance to ride day after day in tough terrain with clubmates and still have a laugh and good company afterwards is far more important than putting yourself through the shredding machine of training for the last degree of performance and then still getting slaughtered in an event by someone who is better than you or dare I say on performance enhancing drugs or with a motorized bike. It really isn't that important.
Whatever does it for you to enjoy cycling then go for it but don't feel compelled to do or try anything just to be part of the trend.