The main thing the Garmin does for me is tell me how far I run. I don't check all the time for pace, maybe that's what the concern is? The on-the-fly pace thing is so inaccurate... but afterwards I like to see what I did. I'm never sure what people mean when they say "don't use the Garmin!" I mean... don't you want to know how far you ran? 4.5 mile easy on the treadmill tonight. First mile was sorta rough. I'm beginning to think that Sunday's run (or maybe the Saturday/Sunday combination?) took a lot out of me...

I use the garmin to tell me distance - The 2 faces I use most often only have 1 thing - 1 is distance and 1 is time of day. I run by feel otherwise - which isn't necessarily the easiest thing to get use to, but once you are there I find it much more enjoyable. Thank you all.

I post here by feel - which is why I didn't post my run from yesterday - too tired and didn't feel like it. Is there a Garmin setting to help with that?? I had limited time so I ran a 1 mile warm up and then 2.5 miles at HM pace (which for me is in the 8:50-9:10 range). Took me a bit to find my rhythm, but otherwise it was a good run. Today will be my mid-week longish run, hoping for 6.5. I'll know when I've run that far by looking at the Garmin on my wrist. On normal (and by that, I mean easy) runs, I use it during the run for four things - distance, how long I've run, hr, and time of day. After the run is when I look at what the pace was.

I was told to loose the garmin because pace and distance doesn't really matter. He thought it would help take the pressure off of me. I do think I would enjoy running more if at least sometimes I just could run. I confess I sometimes guess the distance on recovery runs where certainly the pace doesn't matter. Right now I set my own schedule with some general guidelines and report what time duration I ran, purpose of the workout, condition of the day, and comments for the run at the end of the week. You can measure progress by running a set course every two weeks and see how much time you have taken off, however with the snow and the ice I've had to run whereever the best conditions are and not a course I'd want to run again. I also hate the garmin for races. It's too bulky, I need to use the race mile markers for splits instead of the auto splits. I think I would like a normal timex for races. I'll have to shop around, just wondering if there was suggestions. I could turn everything but time off the display and run like that for weeks without checking the distance. Then at the end I'd still have the data available when I want to see how I did without knowing the pace. You have to admit we record all this data about our runs, and how much of it is really useful? I bet if we all guessed how far and how fast we ran we'd be very accurate.

I bet if we all guessed how far and how fast we ran we'd be very accurate.

I don't know. I bet most of us would guess "not far enough" and "not fast enough" and we'd probably be wrong on both counts.

Thanks Dave, Pace and Lou! Thanks Cash! Dh says he see's a close to 20 min in me though I think he needs new glasses lol. I agree about the faith thing. It is so much easier to see the potential in someone else and have faith that they will reach it than I do for myself. Of course I grew up lacking in self confidance. That is something I've been trying to change for many years. They had a photographer somewhere around 2.75 miles into the race (the last straightway before turning where the finish line was). I snagged the picture that you could actually see me in. My next race I am going more for the #11 look. That was my fastest mile and I shouldn't look like I do (at least not in a 5k)

Nice workout you did there Lou!! I'm hoping to get a good 400 workout with dh today