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Incident detection missing on MTB activity

Albert
over 2 years ago

I just realised that Incident Detection in my Instinct 2 Solar is missing (in fact I realised that lately when I had a crash on my mountain bike and it didn't fire). I saw a thread that it was removed "globally" from similar firmwares like Fenix series etc.

The thing is that action is, well, sorry but totally stupid. Why removing that if it can be easily disabled in activity settings? I understand that in mountain bike specific it may have generate some false alarms, but I suppose that it depends on the style of riding, terrain etc. In fact, I suppose that gravel riding (when incident detection is still possible) may trigger false alarm even more often on some bumpy road as there is no suspension on the bike.

One of the reasons I bought Instinct is incident detection as I often ride my mountain bike alone and this feature is important to me. Even if it sometime will fire some false alarm, you can always discard it easily, better to do this than not having an alarm and notify my family when crash really will happen. 

What's more, my wife is using her Vivoactive 4S (which has incident detection along all of the activitues as there is no separate mountain bike activity) and there is no really many false alarms (and when it is it's usually some heavy breaking etc so it's quite understandable that it fires).

What's even more stupid is that this option is available for e-biking. So it's perfectly fine to have this on e-mtb but not on "analog" one? Come on!

I am really not a complaining type of guy, but this situation triggered me a lot. I feel that I was deceived by Garmin - when I bought Instinct 2, it had incident detection on mountain bike activity and it was on of the reasons I bought it. Now they took it away, so basically the device is no longer the device that I was buying. Maybe I am over reacting but for me it's kinda lawsuit thing.

Garmin please, get yourself together and give users option to enable it(it may be disabled by default so less technical users won't complain for false alarms).

  • +1 over 2 years ago

    Incident detection has not been removed and remains available on the Instinct 2 series. It is correct that the feature does not exist within all activity profiles.

    - Turning Incident Detection On and Off

    - Setting Up and Activating Assistance on a Garmin Device

  • 0 over 2 years ago
    Albert said:
    Now they took it away, so basically the device is no longer the device that I was buying.

    Why don't you simply record the ride as Gravel Bike activity, or just the plain Cycling, if you need the Incident Detection active? You can then change the type of the activity to MTB later in Garmin Connect, if you prefer it in that way.

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to Garmin - Chris

    Well that's the point, it's not available in activities that in my (and a lof other users) opinion would benefit such a feature. Crashes and accidents on MTB(especially Trail and Enduro genre) happens a lot lot more frequent than on gravel or regular cycling. It also happens in mountain,sometimes more or less remote, where there is smaller chance that anyone could find you and help you in compare to road cycling where there are usual a lot of other people passing.

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to trux

    Yeah I suppose it will end like that, although it is far from perfect as those activities lack MTB specific metrics like Grit and Flow that I found interesting and useful. Also, I've chosen Garmin to have this seamless flow and integration, without going to app after activity and changing things both in Garmin and in Strava :) I just don't understand why Garmin took away from users ability to decide if we want that feature on or off on those activities.

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to Garmin - Chris

    I have a Garmin Fenix 6 Pro. There is a simple fix for this.  First, detect the impact, then check if the GPS location stays in the same place for a minute.  If there's an impact, but the person is still moving down the trail, disregard it.  If the person stops after the incident detection and doesn't cancel the alert, send the alert.    Please fix this.  For mountain bikers, it's essential to have this safety feature.

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to 7211230
    7211230 said:
    For mountain bikers, it's essential to have this safety feature

    Some of us would disagree. But an option not to have it might be useful for those who would like alerts sent every time they crash. 

  • 0 over 2 years ago in reply to Dr Phil

    I agree it isn't for everyone.  Especially if you are riding with friends.  Sometimes I have to ride alone because none of my buddies is available.  I had one crash where I was alone and I slid over the top of a berm and was knocked unconscious.  No one saw me on the back side of the berm.  I knew from my tracking that I was there for 10 minutes and I was able to get out on my own, but if it had been worse, it would be nice to know someone could have been notified to find me.  That's why I suggested the delay to send the notification and only if the GPS position hasn't moved for a minute (should be configurable time).  The normal bumps of mountain biking are no problem because you're still moving.  And I agree with you it should be an "option", not "required".  Everyone is different so allowing people to configure all the parameters of this would be great.

  • 0 8 months ago in reply to Garmin - Chris

    That is simply not good enough.

    Yes, the feature does still exist.  But it is enabled only for activities that are less likely to require it.  Removing it from MTB activities is moronic.

    If you were encountering too many false positives, then fix it.  Don't just remove it.  I would FAR prefer a dozen false positives to one missed incident.

  • 0 8 months ago in reply to Garmin - Chris

    I am not very happy about this. I actually upgraded from the instinct solar to this watch mainly for incident detection as my training partner had stopped coming out as much leaving me riding solo. The 2x is not the upgrade I want it to be now. Courses keep crashing the watch and the hrv charts have been messed up for weeks also as reported by others on this forum. Honestly I am not sure if I will stick with it or look for an alternative now.