Pace differs significantly between 2 watches

OVETTCRAMCOE said:

My wife and I both have vivoactive 3 watches. We run together at about the same pace. When we have finished her pace is always significantly faster than mine, at least 15 seconds per mile

Today we ran 4 miles. Her average showed as 10:14 mine was 10:30. Today I was a little stronger and finished about 40 seconds ahead on the last mile. My last mile split was 10:57 while hers was 10:03. How can they be so far off?

Hello! It could potentially be a setting that is different. Do you both have the same GPS setting on the watch? (Press the button > Select Run > Settings > GPS) Is data recording the same on both watches? (Menu > Settings > System > Data Recording)

Thanks for the response. I checked the settings and Data recording is set to Smart on both. I ran today and used my watch and another app on my phone to record the run.

The watch recorded a pace 20 seconds per mile slower than the app. The watch recorded a distance shorter by 0.18 miles on a 4 mile run. That's over 300 yards which is a significant distance.

OVETTCRAMCOE said:

Thanks for the response. I checked the settings and Data recording is set to Smart on both. I ran today and used my watch and another app on my phone to record the run.

The watch recorded a pace 20 seconds per mile slower than the app. The watch recorded a distance shorter by 0.18 miles on a 4 mile run. That's over 300 yards which is a significant distance.

Okay, in the GPS setting, it should either be on "On, GPS +GLONASS or GPS +GALILEO", please make sure it is on GLONASS or GALILEO.

In regards to the data recording, can we change this to "Every Second" and see what the outcome is with both these settings changed?

I set my watch to track every second using GPS+Galileo and did a 2 mile run using the watch and another app on my phone. Both were set to  pause when stopped which happened once when I had to wait for traffic to cross a street. The differences were even more significant. On a 2 mile run these were the splits:

Mile 1 watch 9:54 phone 9:32 diff 22 seconds

Mile 2 watch 10:03 phone 9:35 diff 28 seconds

distance watch 2.03. miles. phone 2.12 miles

OVETTCRAMCOE said:

I set my watch to track every second using GPS+Galileo and did a 2 mile run using the watch and another app on my phone. Both were set to  pause when stopped which happened once when I had to wait for traffic to cross a street. The differences were even more significant. On a 2 mile run these were the splits:

Mile 1 watch 9:54 phone 9:32 diff 22 seconds

Mile 2 watch 10:03 phone 9:35 diff 28 seconds

distance watch 2.03. miles. phone 2.12 miles

Were you able to test a run with your wife's vivoactive 3 after changing the settings? If so and you still see a big discrepancy please let me know. Unfortunately, I am not going to be able to compare/troubleshoot it with the phone app.

That is my next step. I am debating whether to wear one watch on each hand or swap watches and run together.

OVETTCRAMCOE said:

That is my next step. I am debating whether to wear one watch on each hand or swap watches and run together.

I think wearing one on each hand would work well for testing. 

I finally managed to do the 2 watch test over a 5 mile course.

I started the run on both watches within about a second of each other. 

Mile 1 splits were identical

In mile 2, I slowed to almost a walk to navigate an icy turn. My left watch auto-paused for a second and started again but my right watch did not. Lefty was now 0.02 miles behind. 

Mile 3 difference remained constant

Mile 4 I stopped for a drink. Lefty auto paused but righty took a few more seconds. I started up again and lefty was now 0.03 miles behind.

Mile 5 difference remained constant.

Final result on Garmin site after sync:

Lefty 5.02 miles Righty 5.02 miles. Time difference lefty faster by 11 seconds. Average pace.......IDENTICAL. 

So auto-pause is the reason for the difference. That is understandable since the watch has to communicate with a satellite which has to communicate back to the watch for it to figure out I have stopped and the same when I start again. I know my wife tends to manually pause more frequently than I do so that would account for the differences. In my head, I think of pace as simply distance over time with pauses subtracted from time. 

OVETTCRAMCOE said:

I finally managed to do the 2 watch test over a 5 mile course.

I started the run on both watches within about a second of each other. 

Mile 1 splits were identical

In mile 2, I slowed to almost a walk to navigate an icy turn. My left watch auto-paused for a second and started again but my right watch did not. Lefty was now 0.02 miles behind. 

Mile 3 difference remained constant

Mile 4 I stopped for a drink. Lefty auto paused but righty took a few more seconds. I started up again and lefty was now 0.03 miles behind.

Mile 5 difference remained constant.

Final result on Garmin site after sync:

Lefty 5.02 miles Righty 5.02 miles. Time difference lefty faster by 11 seconds. Average pace.......IDENTICAL. 

So auto-pause is the reason for the difference. That is understandable since the watch has to communicate with a satellite which has to communicate back to the watch for it to figure out I have stopped and the same when I start again. I know my wife tends to manually pause more frequently than I do so that would account for the differences. In my head, I think of pace as simply distance over time with pauses subtracted from time. 

Ah, glad it has been figured out. It would definitely record differently if auto pause was turned on. Thank you for letting me know!