Track exported from Basecamp shows as straight line in Garmin Edge 1040

The converted file (just the original track, duplicated and inverted) shows fine in Basecamp: same track, just in the opposite direction. But when I export it as GPX and upload it to the Garmin Edge 1040, it's just a straigt line. 

Finally I imported the original track in Komoot, inverted it there, exported as GPX and sent it to the Garmin, and this time it worked (the inverted track display correctly in the Garmin).

It looks like an issue with Basecamp, but I have no idea what might be happening. 

So, the inverted GPX file does not work on the 1030+.

The export of the regular (non-inverted) GPX file doesn't work on the 1030+.

The issue is that the newer Edges can't read the GPX files produced by BaseCamp.

The GPX files load in other programs (like GPXSee). I don't know what about the GPX files produced by BaseCamp are no longer tolerated by the newer Edges.

It looks like BaseCamp writes the track points in reverse order (newest to oldest). I suspect that's the basis of why the newer Edges aren't reading the file.

It really should be writing the track points in oldest to newest order.

The resulting inverted GPX file shows as a straight line in the Edge, but the original GPX file exported from Basecamp did work just fine on the same device. This issue seems to affect only inverted GPX files, not all files exported from Basecamp. No idea why this happens, perhaps someone from Garmin will see this and find out what the issue is (I am a born optimist).

Where are you getting the original track?

Note that GPX files are text files. They will make some degree of sense if you look at them in a text editor.

I imported an activity FIT file into BaseCamp. I exported it as GPX (no inversion) and the points were in reverse time order. That displayed as a straight line on my 1030+.

Exporting the Activity from Garmin Connect as a GPX shows the expected order of track points and that worked as expected on 1030+.

The files (inverted or not) work as expected on a 1000.

The forum posts are not reliably looked at by Garmin employees. BaseCamp is also in "severe" maintenance mode. (Your optimism might not be realistic!)

It appears the issue is that BaseCamp can write the files with points in reverse time order and the newer Edges don't handle those files.

It might be that the Edge doesn't like time moving backwards.  You could try changing the Activity Profile to Direct.  Then convert the inverted Track to a Route.  Then convert the Route back to a Track.  This will remove the Date/Time data..

The 1000 handles the backward time fine. The 1030+
does not.

It’s not a track without time data.

I suspect the Edges want the time data. 

I think BaseCamp adds time data. 

BaseCamp doesn't add time data, and it doesn't change the existing time of every individual track point. So when you reverse a track, the times are also inverted...

The Edges do use the times for the virtual racer, and the newer ones aren't happy with times in descending order. Ideally BaseCamp should remove time data when reversing a track.

JaVaWa said:

So when you reverse a track, the times are also inverted...

I exported an activity from Garmin Connect.

• If I export as GPX from BaseCamp, the track points are in reverse time order.
• If I convert it using GPSBabel, the track points are in earier-to-later ("normal") time order.

This is not doing any inversion.

The 1030+ and 1000 both deal with GPX files with trackpoints that don't have time.

JaVaWa said:

Ideally BaseCamp should remove time data when reversing a track.

I think some things expect the time data.

BaseCamp should reorder the points to be in ascending time order. It's weird to write the points backwards and it should be fairly easy not to do that. (We probably shouldn't be expecting any changes to be made to BaseCamp.)

If you convert a route to a track, only the first point will get the current time. BaseCamp does not add time data to the other points.

If I import an activity (fit file) into BaseCamp and export it as a GPX, the times (and points) are in correct order. Only when I reverse the track, the times are also in reverse order.

Reordering the points to be in ascending time order will also undo the reversing of the track... That's not what you want when you are reversing a track.

So the best option is to remove the time data altogether. Recalculating times to get them in the right order would get strange results with uphill speeds higher than downhill speeds.