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Record GPS track / distance / speed without counting as exercise (IE: for vehicles)

XterraRob
over 8 years ago
Edit: Forgot to mention, I am using viactiveHR

This was an idea I had, that I think could be useful for people. This may be possible by modifying a custom app easily enough, but I haven't figured it out yet.

Background: Granted, Garmins are geared towards exercise and fitness, but I have found a few times that GPS recording has been useful for non work out activities, but still have some cross over with the outdoor and fitness lifestyle.

Examples:

1) A day taking the boat (motor boat, not rowing, paddle board, etc) out on the lake. Sure, it isn't exercise, but when I am taking the boat out, it often goes hand in hand with camping, hiking, etc for the weekend. It would be nice to capture a GPS track and being able to track speed/pace and timer, etc without having it think I am running. I have used my Garmin Forerunner15 for this before, but of course it then credits me with 30+miles of running and thinks I burned thousands of calories.

2) I often find myself driving my 4WD SUV off road to reach the perfect camping spot where I then end up spending some more time hiking. It would be nice to capture the driven trail to the spot with basic GPS track, distance, and speed without it crediting me for calories and miles ran, etc. Then on the hikes, I can use GPS walking app to take credit for the fitness related aspect of the trip.

I know this is a bit outside of the "fitness" and "athlete" scope of these gadgets, but I still think it would be great (and probably simple) to record the GPS track/distance/speed without it capturing heart rate and crediting you with the calories.

I checked out the apps currently available and there were some maps and GPS related apps, but they mostly showed the map on the actual watch. What I am thinking of is essentially the same screen you get on your watch when running, but not having it send calories and miles ran to Garmin Connect.
  • over 8 years ago
    There is nothing that I know of that an app can do to prevent the activity from being uploaded to Garmin Connect. Once the activity is saved, the system will consider it ready to upload.

    Travis
  • over 8 years ago
    For clarification, I am OK with uploading to GC...to review the map and metrics etc. I would just prefer it not calculate the health metrics and credit it towards my daily averages (IE don't count calorie burn, don't give me a personal record for a boat ride, etc)

    I currently upload to GC as a GPS run, but just know I have to roll back by PRs and know the calorie burn for the day/week are wrong.

    I know it's a bit out of scope for a purely fitness watch, but I think it would be handy.
  • over 8 years ago
    To avoid getting running PR's, record it as a walk and not a run. You may still get things for walk (most steps in a day, etc), but you'd get those even if you weren't recording.

    Internal or CIQ Apps that handle other activity types would work too.

    But if you're recording GPS data so you can see a map on GC, there's no way to avoid things like a calorie number. There's no way to tell the firmware not to record that data.
  • over 8 years ago
    OK cool. Bummer. I thought it would be cool to document an entire weekend of cool activities in GC...AKA drove through the woods to here...set up camp and hiked to here and back. Ran around the lake here, and drove back to civilization here.

    Thanks for the feedback.
  • over 8 years ago
    I do know an app that will record the "hiking" parts of your weekend! :) Hike2!

    And if you decide to go bowling, I'm working on an app for that! :)
  • over 8 years ago
    I do know an app that will record the "hiking" parts of your weekend! :) Hike2!

    And if you decide to go bowling, I'm working on an app for that! :)


    Great, I will have to check it out.

    For the bowling app, what does it record? Your score and # of beers consumed? :p
  • over 8 years ago
    For the bowling app, what does it record? Your score and # of beers consumed? :p


    Actually, you're close! With the new functionality with 2.1, apps can add things to the .fit file, and score is the main thing I plan on, but have considered marking beers, and using a Tempe attached to the beer pitcher to alert you if the beer is starting to get warm! :)
  • over 8 years ago
    Actually, you're close! With the new functionality with 2.1, apps can add things to the .fit file, and score is the main thing I plan on, but have considered marking beers, and using a Tempe attached to the beer pitcher to alert you if the beer is starting to get warm! :)


    HAHAHA! That is pretty awesome! I love it!
  • over 6 years ago
    Actually, you're close! With the new functionality with 2.1, apps can add things to the .fit file, and score is the main thing I plan on, but have considered marking beers, and using a Tempe attached to the beer pitcher to alert you if the beer is starting to get warm! :)


    I'm heading to a bowling lane now. How's your app going? :-)
  • over 6 years ago
    I kind of shelved it. I had much of it working, but didn't finish the storing of data for upload. Maybe one of these days I'll look at it again....