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Treadmill, calibration, Nike+ & Strava Integration issues

MarkVRunner
over 6 years ago
Hi there. I've had my 935 for over a month or so, and I am enjoying it. It has been a great companion for outdoor running. I am having issues, however, with running on a treadmill. My main issue is that once I stop, I use "Calibrate and Save" because whatever distance the watch thinks I've run is lower than what the treadmill actually reads (e.g. ran 5 miles, but Garmin states I ran 4.37). Once I hit save, the Garmin Connect app shows that I ran 5 miles. The problem though is that when I look at Nike+ and Strava, it reads 4.37 miles. I don't know why 4.37 is saved then pushed to other services when I put the correct mileage of 5.

Even more troubling is that my heart rate and pace data does not sync on Nike+ when using the treadmill. At least on Nike+, I can adjust the time and distance run, but I cannot on Strava. Ideally, and as expected, I want to have my calibrated distance and time, along with the other data, like heart rate and pace, to be synced to those services. The 935 can sync my outdoor runs with all that run data. But it cannot do so on a treadmill.

I tried work-arounds, such as exporting the TCX file from Garmin Connect on my web browser. When I pushed it to Nike+, it still reads the inaccurate 4.37 miles, not the 5 miles that I indicated upon calibration. I tried to save the GPX file, but whenever I tried to save it, I get an error saying "no data" or something like that. Even if this did work, this is not an acceptable work-around where the point is for Garmin Connect to integrate with these services.

In the end, it's frustrating because my old TomTom Multisport would sync my outdoor and treadmill runs as expected to those services without any problems, but now my more advanced watch can't seem to do that. Any solutions would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
  • 0 over 6 years ago
    the point is for Garmin Connect to integrate with these services


    Actually no it isn't. The point is for those services to correctly read the information that Garmin is sending them. In this case, these services are reading the data sent to them but appear unable to read the edits Garmin add after the files have been recorded.
  • 0 over 6 years ago
    But it is still unclear why the original data is being pushed out or even saved. When I hit "stop," the watch gives me options to save, calibrate and save, discard, etc. I "calibrate" it by editing to the actual distance run, and then it says "saving." Despite all of that, it is the original/incorrect data that is being saved and pushed instead of the edited data. I don't see how that is Nike / Strava's issue when it is Garmin's file being exported to them. It is also unclear why the TCX file still has the original data prior to calibrating and saving instead of the edited data.
  • 0 over 6 years ago
    Saw the same behavior, when corrected activities displayed right only in Garmin Connect, while Strava shows up old values.
    I am not a Garmin developer, but I can suggest they do not modify activity directly inside the watch, instead just send out to Garmin Connect this "calibration" values along with original activity data. And most likely those values are applied only for internal processing inside Garmin Connect, while uploaded raw files remain untouched.
  • 0 over 6 years ago
    because whatever distance the watch thinks I've run is lower than what the treadmill actually reads

    How do you know?

    I want to have my calibrated distance and time

    Why should Strava trust your calibration?
  • 0 over 6 years ago
    Although I'm not the one who originally wrote that line, the answer to your question is that at the end of the run you can look at the distance on the watch and the distance on the TM display and compare them. Neither are necessarily 100% true but the point of the calibrate feature is simply to get the two machines to agree.

    The Strava bit though is a funny one. On the one hand you would want your Connect and Strava accounts to agree and expect them to accept what comes over from Connect but on the other because of all of the challenges they do they probably want to avoid people gaming the system by putting in excessive TM calibrations and therefore ignore the feature all together. However you can create manual entries that can have any time and distance that you want, although they won't count in challenges.

    Has anybody bothered to dig into a FIT file that's been saved with the calibration to see if it's doing anything other than just changing the total distance for that file? Outside of the file for that run, does entering a calibration change the way the watch will measure future TM runs?

    If it only changes the distance in the file its a pretty useless feature outside of the Garmin system, but if it does actually factor into the TM calibration of the watch then it has some utility when it comes to exporting to other systems, it's just not an immediate benefit.
  • 0 over 6 years ago
    How do you know?


    Why should Strava trust your calibration?


    By looking at the distance traveled on the treadmill...?

    Why is the data that I have not saved on my watch going to Strava to begin with?
  • 0 over 6 years ago
    Although I'm not the one who originally wrote that line, the answer to your question is that at the end of the run you can look at the distance on the watch and the distance on the TM display and compare them. Neither are necessarily 100% true but the point of the calibrate feature is simply to get the two machines to agree.

    The Strava bit though is a funny one. On the one hand you would want your Connect and Strava accounts to agree and expect them to accept what comes over from Connect but on the other because of all of the challenges they do they probably want to avoid people gaming the system by putting in excessive TM calibrations and therefore ignore the feature all together. However you can create manual entries that can have any time and distance that you want, although they won't count in challenges.

    Has anybody bothered to dig into a FIT file that's been saved with the calibration to see if it's doing anything other than just changing the total distance for that file? Outside of the file for that run, does entering a calibration change the way the watch will measure future TM runs?

    If it only changes the distance in the file its a pretty useless feature outside of the Garmin system, but if it does actually factor into the TM calibration of the watch then it has some utility when it comes to exporting to other systems, it's just not an immediate benefit.


    Thanks for the input. I use the treadmill for different types of runs. Sometimes just to cruise, sometimes for getting negative splits, or for intervals, etc. Does the watch require calibration at the first mile for each type of activity? I can see how the watch may not pick up how fast I’m actually going based on my arm swing alone.
  • 0 over 5 years ago
    I have noticed the same thing. I usually only do a treadmill once a week as I happen to be at the gym for other classes. With my TomTom I could calibrate the distance on the watch at the end of the treadmill run to replicate whatever the treadmill data was. That exact same detail would travel to Strava, TomTom and a few other apps I use. With the 645 I save and calibrate at the end of the run but whatever the watch face said at the time I finished is what goes into Strava. MapMyRun has the calibrated distance. Today's run was 5.10 km on the treadmill but the watch recorded 5.81. My other watch was always pretty close to the treadmill info so a small adjustment at the end didn't make much difference but 0.71 km extra today shows I ran an average of 4.04 pace but reality was 4.37.
  • 0 11 months ago
      
    I know this question is really old! But I built a tool for Garmin -> Strava users to fix this issue and a lot of people are already signed up and finding value in it if you want to check it out!!