Data source for FirstBeat metrics

Ah okay, I didn't realize Stryd has the altimeter. Does that mean a Stryd will generate incorrect power data when running on a treadmill set to an incline?

UPDATE: It does not...

https://support.stryd.com/hc/en-us/articles/360001658293-Why-does-my-power-not-go-up-if-I-increase-the-treadmill-incline-

Errh.. your link says that it does. Unless you use the app and tell it what your incline is.

The Stryd people have hinted that we will get one or two christmas presents this year, and one of them might be automatic incline detection on treadmills. (While the other might be detection of wind resistance.)

Yes I got that backwards. As you say the Stryd has an altimeter of some type that senses if the runner is going uphill or down, so it fails to properly report power on an inclined treadmill. Unless you use it's app and tell it the incline.

Hey folks, apologies for the topic necromancy - but I have a bit of extra time today, so I dropped in to share what I can.

As far as the Firstbeat analytics engine goes... GPS or accelerometer data can be used as the external workload parameter, that said, device designers get to make their own decisions about which inputs get used in different scenarios. As I understand, those decisions can get pretty complicated pretty fast.

For an example of a Garmin device feeding accelerometer data in to the Firstbeat analytics engine to estimate VO2max, look no further than the vívosmart 3 and 4, both of which estimate VO2max but do not have GPS.

It's possible that the data coming from Stryd (or any other similarly paired 3rd party sensor) is very good, but it's probably very difficult to take how good that data is across the board into consideration and think of all the possibilities at a design stage. Sometimes, I suspect it's just about making things work that you know will work, and that's tough.

HermanB Thanks for confirming that this is not a limitation set from your side.

So, I guess it's Garmin-Heath or odsweng that should be able to bring this further and hopefully provide an important improvement to the usability of the product? ;)

Hey folks, apologies for the topic necromancy - but I have a bit of extra time today, so I dropped in to share what I can.

As far as the Firstbeat analytics engine goes... GPS or accelerometer data can be used as the external workload parameter, that said, device designers get to make their own decisions about which inputs get used in different scenarios. As I understand, those decisions can get pretty complicated pretty fast.

For an example of a Garmin device feeding accelerometer data in to the Firstbeat analytics engine to estimate VO2max, look no further than the vívosmart 3 and 4, both of which estimate VO2max but do not have GPS.

It's possible that the data coming from Stryd (or any other similarly paired 3rd party sensor) is very good, but it's probably very difficult to take how good that data is across the board into consideration and think of all the possibilities at a design stage. Sometimes, I suspect it's just about making things work that you know will work, and that's tough.

Hi Herman,

thanks for the insight. The sad thing is that Stryd distance is a LOT more precise than any Garmin GPS watch even outdoors.

And indoors on treadmill there is not very many things that can compete either (see DC Rainmaker - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQV5Dlvvwhg )

So for another runner running mostly indoors during winter - I too would like FB metrics indoors and using footpods.

Please Garmin-Heath and other Garmin people here - please enable Footpods and other powermeters for FirstBeat calculations - both for indoor and outdoor exercise.

Garmin, my wife's Vivosmart 3 calculates her vo2 max while running on a treadmill but my Vivosport will only calculate vo2 max when running/waling outdoors. This is nuts. There is no reason that the user should not be able to chose. I will probably need to downgrade a Vivosmart 3 or 4 because I am too old to run, and have no decent flat ground for walking without driving to the city and finding a parking lot.

Please fix this Garmin.

The reason is simple: The FirstBeat algorithm are only as good as the quality of the data they are fed with. Therefore, I want to know (and choose) which data is going into my fitness and performance calculations.

I don’t wan’t anything to be based on optical wrist HR sensor (I know, that one is easy to avoid), and I don’t want anything to be based on GPS speed, simply beacause the data quality from those two sources are not good enough.

Recent discoveries has revealed that the situation is even worse, since I’m now getting fitness updates «out of thin air» after a long period with no outdoor running. My Fenix 5 Plus is now rendered totally useless in terms of fitness montoring, and I would have just as much benefit from a simple HR monitor and a stopwatch. (Ref this thread: https://forums.garmin.com/forum/on-t...t-vo2max/page3 )