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Running or training with a weight vest

Former Member over 4 years ago

I have the Garmin 645M and typically use the watch to track my running and other cardio activity. I have a weighted vest that I occasionally use for training, and I'm curious if anyone has found the best way to incorporate that in to your Garmin watch to get the most accurate results? I've been holding off using it with this watch until I get some feedback about the best way to do it. I figure there are two ways. I could either change my weight in Garmin Connect (to account for the added weight of the vest), or just leave it set at my normal weight and the cardio changes will be reflected in my higher heart rate. But if all the sudden my heart rate spikes and pace slows for a random workout (while wearing the vest), is that going to screw up my VO2 calculations?

0 tmk2 over 4 years ago

But if all the sudden my heart rate spikes and pace slows for a random workout (while wearing the vest), is that going to screw up my VO2 calculations?

Yes, it will.

0 Attila_Molnar over 4 years ago

There is an application in CIQ named Runsafe+.

In that you can add extra weight for your activities. However I do not know if it affects VO2 calculation in any way.

0 Former Member over 4 years ago

Thanks for the replies. I just realized the easiest way around this is probably just to use the "cardio" setting when doing workouts with the weight vest. I'm not going to get credit for the miles or anything, but at least I'll log calories burned via heart rate monitoring.

0 2703637 over 4 years ago

For what it's worth, I have a similar problem in that I sometimes run with a child in a running buggy (+25kg), which obviously elevates heart rate, causes extra effort, etc. When doing a run like that I use the 'trail run' rather than normal 'run' activity, so you still track mileage, calories, elevation etc. but it doesn't mess up VO2max. Garmin doesn't count trail runs for VO2max calculations because elevation, terrain etc. have an unpredictable effect.