Unable to finish training when last segment is "until lap press"

1540713 14 days ago

Hello everyone,

I've recently started experiencing an issue with workouts on my Forerunner 955. I'm unable to complete any workout if the last segment is set to end with a "lap button press".

I usually set the final segment of a workout as Rest or Cooldown, configured to end when I press the lap button. Previously, pressing the button would finish the workout and display the completion screen with the percentage score.

However, now I can't finish the workout at all (training can only end when I finish activity completely). Pressing the Lap button either just marks a lap and shows the lap screen (when the lap button is enabled for the activity), or does nothing at all (when the lap button is disabled for the activity). The button still works normally for skipping segments — just not at the very end. I’m stuck on the screen saying “Press lap button to finish workout.”

This behavior occurs on Forerunner 955 software version 24.12, and I already noticed the same issue before the latest update.

Any ideas? Is this a known bug? It's quite frustrating, as I’ve lost the ability to properly control the flow of my structured workouts like I used to.

0 soptunna 14 days ago

It seems to be expected behaviour nowadays. Garmin have slowly changed this specific use case over the last year. See discussion in the Beta forum area:

"21.19 (ish): Undocumented change to workouts (LAP button no longer ends a workout) + new bugs"

https://forums.garmin.com/beta-program/forerunner-955-series/f/community-discussion/396399/21-19-ish-undocumented-change-to-workouts-lap-button-no-longer-ends-a-workout-new-bugs

I'm still at FW 19.18 which can break out of an ending 'Lap button press' by adding a final distance step - that you can terminate/skip by the Lap button - but they have completely eliminated this workaround in later FWs. The last FW with (our kind of) expected behaviour was, to my knowledge, FW17.x. (I skipped 18.x. versions so have no experience there).

[Edit: If you add for example a final timebased step of a few seconds Running or whatever after the Cooldown segment, you should still be able to end the Cooldown with the Lap button. It looks slightly messy and strange but is the only workaround I can think of]

0 nowster 14 days ago

This has always been the case for me. A lap button press on the last training segment just puts a lap marker in that segment.

I always finish the workout by pressing the START button. This doesn't seem to affect the Execution Score.

0 1540713 14 days ago in reply to soptunna

Hi, thanks for the answer. I figured the workaround with adding the few second segment at the end too.

I don't quite buy the "expected behavior" narrative because:

1) Up until few weeks ago watch behaved as expected

2) The final screen clearly says that I can finish training by pressing the button, I wish the $350 watch actually did what it claims to do

0 1540713 14 days ago in reply to nowster

Hi, thanks for the answer. It is interesting since I've started to experience this only few trainings ago. I of ccourse also end the activity+training by Start button, but I used to have a possibility to end training without finishing the activity. Watch still says I can finish training by Lap button but it does not react to it :/

0 robertinmc 14 days ago

This worked well on older devices... a step backwards? I don't understand how these things happen and such a measure is implemented. I've also noticed it on my recent device.

0 DaKo 13 days ago

This has always been the case for me, since I use the FR955. Already for three years now. Never worked with the lap button, always have to use the start/end button to stop.

0 FlowState 10 days ago in reply to 1540713

1540713 said:
2) The final screen clearly says that I can finish training by pressing the button

Yes this is the biggest problem. In this case, the watch says "Run until Lap press" and ofc that's how the workout was configured. And all the other workout steps can be ended by pressing the lap button, just not the final step. This is an inconsistency imo.

Garmin should just say "run forever".

It's also inconsistent that the final workout step can be ended if it has a set duration (time or distance), which is why workaround exists where you can just add a final step of a few seconds.

Idk what problem Garmin was trying to solve with this.

This does remind me of a change they made in the past, which apparently was meant to appease one group of users but only alienated the rest of them. In the distant past, if you ended a workout, the activity would end. Some people didn't like that, so they changed it so the activity continues when the workout ends. Personally I don't mind that the activity continues, but a few have complained in the forums about this. e.g. "I did a workout of exactly 5.0 km, but my activity didn't end and now I have extra distance."

I think this latest change is kinda ironic, because now it means that certain kinds of workouts (*) won't end until the activity ends. (The opposite of the original problem.)

(*) Specifically, those which have "run until lap press" as the final step.

I will say that if your final step is really "run until lap press" it's probably a cooldown and it probably doesn't matter whether pressing the lap button will end the workout or not.

0 FlowState 10 days ago in reply to DaKo

DaKo said:
This has always been the case for me, since I use the FR955. Already for three years now. Never worked with the lap button, always have to use the start/end button to stop.

No, they're talking about ending the structured workout [*] within a running activity, not the running activity itself.

[*] a series of predetermined steps or intervals, like run, rest, recover, warmup and cooldown. Like:

- Warmup until lap press
- 4 x [
- 800m run
- 60 seconds rest
]
- Cooldown until lap press

What they're saying is that if you follow a workout, and the final step is "run until lap press", then pressing the lap button won't actually end the workout. No one is saying that pressing the lap button should stop or end the activity. To be clear, the activity will keep going even if the workout ends, which is the point of this discussion.

Why does it matter? Maybe it doesn't, but there are ways to tell that the workout is finished.

- You typically get a screen with your execution score when the workout is finished

- You get a different kind of lap screen when you press the lap button during a workout as opposed to after the workout is finished