New Garmin Swim - Missing Laps

Is this normal for it to miss laps?

I've got 228.7mi on my Garmin Swim. That's 16,104 laps. About half of those laps have been with v3.6. The only added/missed laps I've had - maybe a half dozen total - have been due to something going amiss with the swim. Stopping for a cramp, running into another swimmer, etc.

I've played with it pretty extensively, and the only things I can do to get it to miscount laps is to purposely use bad (I mean horrible) stroke technique or not push off the wall. (I do open turns as well.) The GS doesn't even balk when I stop briefly to swig a drink or adjust my swim cap or goggles.

Wearing the GS too loosely also seems to be problematic.

Look first to technique, and see if that helps.

The Garmin Swim does occasionally miss lengths for some users. Make sure you do a strong push off the wall and a long glide phase (swim coaches encourage this anyway). It may also help to wear the watch on the arm that does not take the first stroke after you turn.

Hi,

The watch works by monitoring how your arms/body move using accelerometers. When you swim laps, Your arms moves in a regular pattern with each stroke. When you get to the wall, your arms stop moving, you make a turn (open or flip doesn't matter) and you push the wall in the opposite direction. This change in pattern is how the watch can detect you completed a lap.

The first length of the first workout is 1:15 minutes with 29 strokes, which is 3 times your average for a typical length. This means the watch has troubles detecting your turns. I usually get the opposite, extra laps. So I can't say for sure what is happening. But I could imagine, getting at the wall, and there is a bunch of people resting making a regular turn impossible. I would have to briefly stop, and resume swimming in the opposite direction. Because, there are no strong push off the wall followed by a glide, the watch might miss a turn. Does it make sense?

In your second workout, the the watch has clearly miss a couple of turns in the firsts few lengths, but there are also a few occurrences where we can see a short length followed by a longer one, For example, length 30 (21 sec, 7 strokes), followed by length 31 (38 sec, 13 strokes). Unless you did this on purpose. This could be a clue that the watch has again missed a turn or that it has problems detecting your turns.

So the advice would be, strong push off the wall followed by a glide. This is the way to go. It will also make you swim faster, because the beginning of the length right after the push is when you move the fastest, and fast swimmer make sure the get the best out of it.

If accurate data is an issue for you, I made a tool that you can use to edit you garmin Swim data. It allows you to merge and split lengths, and change stroke style. It's free to use http://www.swimmingwatchtools.com/

New Garmin Swim - Missing Laps

Thanks everyone for the responses. I will have to do some more testing. Just for some background:

1. I had my whole lane to myself the entire time, both swims (the pool was dead).
2. I had read about the strong push and glide before the first use, and had consciously tried to emulate that.
3. Of the three disciplines, swimming certainly isn't my best! Maybe it could be a form thing? I can swim forever, just not fast or the best form.

Again, nothing unusual at all on the intervals (no crowds, stops, etc, etc), just 3 X 500yd intervals in each workout (25yd pool, 10 round trip laps each interval).

Would your advice be to give it a few more shots and see if it improves?

Thanks again for the feedback.

Damon

Thanks everyone for the responses. I will have to do some more testing. Just for some background:

1. I had my whole lane to myself the entire time, both swims (the pool was dead).
2. I had read about the strong push and glide before the first use, and had consciously tried to emulate that.
3. Of the three disciplines, swimming certainly isn't my best! Maybe it could be a form thing? I can swim forever, just not fast or the best form.

Again, nothing unusual at all on the intervals (no crowds, stops, etc, etc), just 3 X 500yd intervals in each workout (25yd pool, 10 round trip laps each interval).

Would your advice be to give it a few more shots and see if it improves?

Thanks again for the feedback.

Damon

Yes. I would suggest trying several more swims and also to try changing the watch arm, unless you find this too uncomfortable.

On 3. above, that is not the issue. I checked out your GC links.

Thanks everyone for the responses. I will have to do some more testing. Just for some background:

1. I had my whole lane to myself the entire time, both swims (the pool was dead).
2. I had read about the strong push and glide before the first use, and had consciously tried to emulate that.
3. Of the three disciplines, swimming certainly isn't my best! Maybe it could be a form thing? I can swim forever, just not fast or the best form.

Again, nothing unusual at all on the intervals (no crowds, stops, etc, etc), just 3 X 500yd intervals in each workout (25yd pool, 10 round trip laps each interval).

Would your advice be to give it a few more shots and see if it improves?

Thanks again for the feedback.

Damon

You have reasons to be disappointed. I'm pretty sure that if I could swim with a lane to myself, I would get 100% accurate data. Unfortunately, I usually go to pools open to the general public with 3-8 swimmers per lane, but I manage to get pretty accurate data. It take something pretty drastic to confuse the watch. I would certainly not expect it to miss 2 consecutive turns like it did in you first workout. I'm also average swimmer and like technology. Not part of a club, don't do competition, just feel good in the water, swimming freestyle only, no flip turns. Do some more testing. You might get used to it. If it doesn't meet your expectation, it might not be for you, or you might have a bad unit.

Would your advice be to give it a few more shots and see if it improves?

Damon, the watch will not magically improve. So "giving it a few more shots" isn't going to change anything unless you change your swim technique. And by change, I mean "improve" your swim technique.

Go to any pool and watch people swim. Even people who ostensibly know what they are doing have poor - or at least inconsistent - form.

Are you getting a good push off the wall? Doesn't need to be a monster push, nor do you need to glide a terribly long distance. Do you start moving your arms immediately? Is your stroke count/cadence uniform... not per the GS, but in reality? Do you do the flailing little "curvy S thing" that most people do with their hands when they swim freestyle?

I know there's a handful of people who complain about issues of miscounting, but to me the fact that there are those of us who have ZERO problems tells me that the GS with v3.6 is an accurate device.

Unless, maybe there's a random flaw in the unit/firmware that causes it to be inaccurate, yet somehow I (and many others) have a swim technique that is perfectly, equally, and so completely oppositely randomly flawed in such a way that it counters the underlying random flaw in the device.

I'm certainly not claiming that I have 100% perfect form - my occasional coach would suggest I've got plenty of room for improvement - but my form is pretty good. In fact, I credit swim watches like the GS (I had a different brand prior to my GS) with helping improve my form. In part by looking at stroke efficiency and times. But also because my previous "other brand" watch was far less forgiving, so I had to work pretty hard to keep it on track.

If the GS doesn't track your swims accurately, don't hope that "it" improves. See what you can do to improve your technique. I'm a fan of swimsmooth.com for an easy, intuitive way for most people to immediately adopt better, more consistent technique.

Ray

Ray,

I don't claim to have a perfect stroke, as you apparently do, but my swim form isn't horrible according to others I have had look. I use bilateral breathing, a strong push off the wall, and the ONLY issue that has been pointed out to me has been getting my back legs up a little higher in the water. Remember, any inaccuracies only happen in the first few links. After that, it is spot on.

That being said, I am not saying it is the device or the firmware, just was wondering others experience. If not having a perfect swim technique, like you are so blessed to have, prevents this from being a device that can be relied on, they just need to market it as such. "Requires perfect swim stroke for accuracy".

I love Garmin, and have used them for fitness devices since the first one they ever released (although not the most comfy oval watch on my wrist)! I don't think their intent was to market to swimmers with a perfect stroke, just like they don't market their Forerunner lines to those with perfect running and bike technique (I know, not a fair comparison since those mostly use GPS).

All of that being said, I'm not real interested in your experiment on the watches (not sure what it would prove), but I would maybe be interested in throwing on my new 620 and having a little running race (any distance 5k-Marathon)! I have no doubt you are a better swimmer than me, but there is a good chance I could outrun and/or out bike you. :)

sunk hampinm

Ray,

I don't claim to have a perfect stroke, as you apparently do, but my swim form isn't horrible according to others I have had look. I use bilateral breathing, a strong push off the wall, and the ONLY issue that has been pointed out to me has been getting my back legs up a little higher in the water. Remember, any inaccuracies only happen in the first few links. After that, it is spot on.

Crap - I just spent a ton of time writing a considerate post analyzing your swim data to illustrate where technique was confusing your Garmin Swim. But the board locked up and I lost the whole damn thing!

:mad:

Long story short:

• I didn't mean to come across as pompous or "I'm a better swimmer than you" and am sorry that's how it obviously came across,
  
• You don't need "perfect form" to use the GS, but unlike their running and cycling devices, the GS is a "dumb" device in that it does everything based on accelerometers that tell the watch which way it's facing, how fast it's moving, and in what direction it's heading. Technique impacts every single one of those things.
  
• There are clear technique things you are doing that will easily confuse the GS. But you're wrong above when you say it's spot on after the first few lengths. As evidenced by your stroke counts and lap times, the GS seems to have mis-detected many more laps than just the few that you point out at the beginning of the sets. You don't see it at first because the GS appears to have actually counted the proper NUMBER of laps in most cases, but it failed to properly detect where one lap ended and the next began. Look at instances where you had improbably fast laps with few strokes (20sec, 7 strokes) followed by longer-than-average laps with high-stroke counts. There's even one series that goes 10-7-13-7-13-7-11. Highly unlikely you'd have nearly a 100% swing in stroke count from one lap to the next over five laps.
  
• The mis-reading of breaststroke - and potentially over-counting of strokes on freestyle - is likely due to a freestyle technique that involves some combination or all of the following 1.) Raising your wrist higher than your elbow out of the water then bringing it down forcefully before pushing it forward, 2.) Swinging your hand beyond your midline laterally (crossing over in front of your head) out front of your stroke, and 3.) using the typical "s-shaped pull" that many recreational swimmers use. The net result of these things is that instead of reading a simple "1-2" forward-backward motion, your GS reads something that looks like up/forward-down/backward-forward/in-forward/out-backward/in-backward/out. Could be one breastroke, two freestyle strokes, or god knows what.
  
• Adopting a better technique will not only ensure better GS accuracy, but it will make you a stronger, faster swimmer.
  

Take a look at swimsmooth.com. Their freestyle simulator is clear and intuitive. It's interactive on their website, but here's a YouTube video...

http://youtu.be/IyR7JYllk9U

And here is the technique with a real (Olympic) swimmer...

http://youtu.be/s3HhNlysFDs

I'm not "blessed" with good technique, I work at it. I've only been swimming for two years, and the biggest part of my success in this area has actually been using swim watches like the GS. My previous watch was even less forgiving than the GS, this revealed to me a fault in my technique rather than a fault in the watch. Once I started using that watch - and swimsmooth technique - my 100yd pace went from over 2:05/100yd (where you are) down to 1:40/100yd almost overnight. A year later and my typical daily swim is at a 1:28/100yd pace over 3,000yds.

...but I would maybe be interested in throwing on my new 620 and having a little running race (any distance 5k-Marathon)! I have no doubt you are a better swimmer than me, but there is a good chance I could outrun and/or out bike you.

You're right about beating me on foot. At the age of 48, I firmly believe one should only run if being chased. (And even then, only fast enough to avoid being caught.)

As to swimming, with the GS and swimsmooth.com I have no doubt that you'll be even with me in the pool very soon.

As far as cycling? Well, I suspect that I'm more than few years older than you. But I won't hold your youth and inexperience against you. (I'm a far stronger cyclist than I am a swimmer.)

Have fun, and do checkout swimsmooth.com. There’s enough phenomenal free information on their website that you won’t need to buy any of their training materials.

:cool: