Steps and distance when doing "Other" activity

Alex, I am not quite sure I follow what the issue is. My experience is that the activity tracking (steps, sleep, etc) are recorded by the widget and tracked separately from a timed activity like run, run indoors, bike, bike indoors, and other. Looking back at my recorded run and indoor run activities uploaded to GC, there is no step count associated with those activities. What the run activities do provide is the steps/min info for running cadence, but not a total step count. The other activity profile is available to record HR over time for non running activities such as squash or anything else not directly supported by the watch.

If you note your step count in the widget before you do a squash activity, I bet you will find the watch widget is still recording your steps, just not into the activity. If you go look at your steps page for the day when you did the last activity you will find the 15 minute windows where you were recording the activity will likely be marked as highly active.

Yeah, if you're indoors you're not going to be using the GPS portion of the watch, so it's basically going to only record time and your heart rate. I think you would have to pair the watch with the Garmin Foot Pod (and calibrate it by doing a few outdoor runs with GPS turned on) if you're wanting to track the number of steps/cadence and distance indoors. I understand the watch should be calculating your steps/cadence based off the accelerometer in the watch, but I would think that might be fairly erratic while playing squash.

What I menat in the first podt is that when I use "run indoors" (without foot pod) I can see the distance that I have run, and the pace, heart rate and cadence in the grap screen. When I use "other", there is no distance in the global activity screen, and only the heart rate in the graphs.

So in "run indoors" mode the FR uses the internal accelerometer to calculate distance, as expected, but when using "other" this data is not saved. Maybe "other" is only meant to be used with activities that do not imply walking/running (weight lifting, rowing, etc...) but I think that could be an option in the activity settings...

aLeX

'Other' activity

Following this Alex. I had same problem yesterday. Used 'Other' activity to record my zumba class. All it recorded was my time. Big deal, i already know my time. Was hoping for distance and maybe steps. Not sure what the point of 'Other' activity is. :(

Following this Alex. I had same problem yesterday. Used 'Other' activity to record my zumba class. All it recorded was my time. Big deal, I already know my time. Was hoping for distance and maybe steps. Not sure what the point of 'Other' activity is. :(

As far as I know, that's pretty much how the Other activity profile is setup to operate. The default settings for the Other profile have GPS turned off, so you're really only measuring time and heart rate, if you have a heart rate monitor attached. If you don't have a heart rate monitor, then yes, I believe you're only going to be measuring the time. The Forerunner 230 is, in fact, marketed as a running watch, not so much as an all-encompassing activity watch. For that, you would have to spend more money to get either the Forerunner 630 or maybe even one of the vivoactive units, if you're looking to stay in the world of Garmin. Using a foot pod during your Zumba class might help with the cadence issue and/or the distance, but I'm not really sure why you would want or need that information for Zumba. Without a calibrated foot pod on your shoe, your cadence on an indoor/Other activity is going to be dependent on the accelerometer within the watch, which could vary greatly depending on how you swing your arm with the watch on it. I hope that helps and sheds some light on the "shortcomings" of your situation.

I use the "other" activity for my crossfit class. Paired with a chest strap so that I can see heart rate, calories burned etc etc. Basically use this to see how hard I am pushing in workouts. Then of course using the running and bike apps for what they are intended.

The other is really only valuable if you wear for me, if I am wearing a matching heart rate monitor.

I wish I could add custom title activities like I could on my Polar m400, but this watch plows that out of water.

Just use "Run Indoor" mode and turn of Auto Lap.

The Garmin 230 has a built in pedometer so under any mode if you're not using GPS then the internal pedometer should record movement even in "Other Mode". I too was slightly confused my it's function having done circuits yesterday mixed with some sprints but on completion it told me I had not moved a single meter! I know the foot pod works fine but yesterday I did not use it thinking the pedometer would do it's job!

Other

Just use "Run Indoor" mode and turn of Auto Lap.

The Garmin 230 has a built in pedometer so under any mode if you're not using GPS then the internal pedometer should record movement even in "Other Mode". I too was slightly confused my it's function having done circuits yesterday mixed with some sprints but on completion it told me I had not moved a single meter! I know the foot pod works fine but yesterday I did not use it thinking the pedometer would do it's job!

Thanks Martin. I will gove that a try tomorrow morning in class and see how it goes!