Why does my fenix 6 pace jump about so much? The pace it says is no where near the pace that clicks on every mile

Because it's on your wrist, and your wrist swings back and forth while you run. To see what I mean, mount it to your bicycle handlebars and you'll notice it's a lot smoother and more accurate.

If having accurate instant pace is important to you, you can use a footpod to achieve that. If you don't want a footpod, then you can get better pace info by using the built in Lap Pace datafield, or use one from the CIQ store that uses a rolling average.

• I’ve used garmin watches for the last 6 years and never had this issue. I appreciate that pace won’t be totally accurate whilst moving but it’s crazy wrong. Whilst running it’ll say I’m moving at 9 min mile pace then the mile clicks and the pace I’ve been running at will say 7:30 (example). This is only really a problem if trying to do speed work so very frustrating. Especially when you spend over £600 on a watch. 

Hi C.sco can you recommend such a CIQ datafield. Am a bit overwhelmed by the multitude of available datafields ;-) thx in advance...

bchalmers1 said:

I’ve used garmin watches for the last 6 years and never had this issue.

I’ve been using Garmin since the days of the FR305 and have never had any good results from instant pace. The only time I get a useful pace is when using a custom workout. 

bchalmers1

There are some extensive discussions in this forum. If you spend even the shortest time doing a search you’ll find more than enough discussion, suggested solutions, and fantastic inventions.

If you use the Single Run Field datafield, you have various pace options inc. 30s rolling average if I remember correctly did'nt suffer the wild swings from what Garmin generally reports.

I got good instant pace from Fitbit and Polar but never much luck on Garmin, its not a F6 Pro specific issue

Thank you. Giving it a try..

Same experience. I've had it (F6Pro) for about 4 months, and a couple of weeks into it started going crazy. Average pace OK, instant pace was all over the place, like 2 min/mile more. All it took was a sharp turn, and it would take forever to recover. My impression is that it started happening with the update to v 13 of the firmware. I returned it, in the end. I know pace and GPS tracking in general can be imprecise, but my old watch (different brand) is much smoother and recover faster. They agree on distance, average pace, and cadence, for example. It's the instant pace that's nuts.

bchalmers1 said:

Whilst running it’ll say I’m moving at 9 min mile pace then the mile clicks and the pace I’ve been running at will say 7:30 (example).

Yep. This is exactly what I have been complaining about for more than a year. The pace isn't just inaccurate. It is consistently biased towards slower than actual pace, and that can't be explained by inaccuracy due to arm movements GPS glitches.

There are several other threads on this subject, and I've seen comments where users mentioned that the pace clearly depends on cadence (arm movements), and that it can be manipulated by moving arms faster while running with the same pace. 

Also there are reports that recording a run by using cycling mode produces more accurate pace. Apparently that disables the cadence factor. 

Yesterday I did a small test with configuring the Autolap for the lowest possible distance (200 meters). Then I compared the pace from the "Pace" diagram with the pace from the "Lap" for the same time period (when a severe pace dropout occurred).

As you can see the "Pace" diagram (this is the value shown as the instant pace in the watch data field) is really off compared to the "Lap" pace. And the "Lap" pace is also lagging behind a little bit...

Pace diagram (Pace between approx ~8-11 min/km):

Lap info (Avg Pace 7:27 min/km):

In lack of a more reliable method (stryd or footpod) the Fenix seems to use your arm movements to detect your pace. That seems to not be working out very well for you.

I have run my last two weeks without the use of a footpod but my Fenix still gives med figures that correspond pretty well with the lap times. In other words: this doesn’t seem to happen to everybody.

I would buy a footpod/stryd if I were you and pace is important for your training. Oh, and contact Garmin support with the data you have collected.

I know I said the forbidden thing here in suggesting that you buy more sensors to your $1000 watch...