I go back and forth with my Garmin, depending on what my goal is. When I’m training for a race, I am an absolute slave to it 99% of the time. When I’m not training, I usually go without it, unless I want to know my distance. It definitely is an awesome tool, but it has a time and a place.

I am a totally slave to my Garmin and find myself checking it numerous times throughout each run. Sometimes I’m able to ignore the numbers I’m seeing, but other times they totally get into my head and I have to fight to stay focused and not let an unexpected pace completely derail my workout.

I usually use my garmin for distance only when I’m doing a long run but I do like it if I’m doing a s&f (short and fast, or sweaty and fun depending on my mood!). I did read an article on using watches and it said that you should only use a watch as a pacer every once in a while, otherwise we tend to neglect our bodies and our natural feelings. The amount of effort you *feel* you put out is truly all that matters because it’s all relative 🙂 P.S. you’re a rockstar.

I was just coming to suggest what Kara said!

I used to be a Garmin addict! My boyfriend would give me crap about it all the time, because he didn’t understand the desire to monitor by time/distance/pace, because he’s really laid back about working out.

I’m running less now that I’m not training for anything specific (I ran a half marathon and two 5Ks this summer), and when I do run, I’ve been heading out without the Garmin. I run on the same trail that I was always training on, so I know pretty much exactly where the mile markers are. Without the Garmin I find my runs to be a bit more relaxed and leisurely, instead of competing with myself. I think it helps me to relax my uptight-ness a little bit to go Garmin-free.

I also love seeing my mileage on my garmin, and wear it on 99% of my runs. You can change the options for the viewing screen so that your pace is not shown, just the time and the distance.

I mostly just look at the bottom right corner where the mileage is but if I’m curious about my pace or I’m trying to run faster/slower on purpose I’ll make sure I’m at the right speed. I’m surprised I haven’t gotten too addicted to watching the pace, actually!

I don’t time for two reasons: when I want an easy run and when I want to push myself. Time distracts me more than anything. For easy runs I need to ignore that talking lady! I love going back and looking at my splits but the more aware I am of my splits during the run, the more I can psych myself out. I ran my fastest average pace for a run of 8+ miles on Saturday (11 miles) because I wanted to push myself & decided to go by feel instead of obsessing over pace. It helped that I was with some much faster people but I kept it comfortably hard and it was a great confidence booster. I now expect to smash my previous goal for my first half marathon!

Yeah, it’s a tough balance. I do think it’s neat to see your stats after a run, and they can be informative, or help your perform better, but I usually don’t bring my iPhone (I use the runkeeper app) on runs because I don’t want running to turn into yet another thing where I feel pressure to being go faster, longer, doing better. Enough in my life is already like that and I want to keep running as a n enjoyable stress release that makes me feel good, not yet another thing where I have to be doing a better job.

Glad to know I’m not the only sleep deprived, dehydrated, crabby ass mama. 🙂

I do run with a garmin but I don’t look at it much. I run mostly based on my breathing — my cadence is pretty consistent, so depending on what kind of running I’m doing I know more or less how many steps per breath correlates to a decent effort for me. (e.g. easy or long run pace = 4-5 steps per in or out breath; tempo run = 3; sprints/hard effort = 2). Then the mile splits from my watch just give me some additional nerd-info.

I had this same problem on my run today! I wore my Garmin and was constantly checking my pace…..I was barely breaking 11 min/mile and it felt like 9! Roman (now 3.5 months old) DID sleep all the way through the night so I wasn’t super sleep deprived…..but really one night of full sleep doesn’t make a difference. I tried “sprinting” and checked my Garmin – 9 minute mile – I was running 8:30 min/miles the first few months of my pregnancy! So frustrating…..but I keep thinking about the mantra I saw on your blog – “You’re lapping everyone on the couch”. At least we’re out there! 🙂

I don`t own a Garmin yet (it`s on my birthday wishlist) but I am really looking forward to using one. Not necessarily to know my pace all the time but simply because I won`t have to stick to the number of routes that I know the exact distances of. Instead I can run wherever I want and I think that is great!

I sometimes get too focused on my pace too. But I’m actually trying to improve my distance, so pace should be the last thing I’m thinking about! I know we’re supposed to go slower if we want to run farther, but I just hate seeing my pace slip above 10 min/mile so I try to keep it below – but then that makes me burn out faster and I can’t run the distances I’d like. 😛

I never time my runs and always just go with how I feel. I use mapmyrun to get a few routes (usually categorized by distance) and then I run those routes. If I feel like I want to keep going, I just keep running and then plug in the new route when I get home. I found that being a slave to time wasn’t really that helpful to me. I am not the fastest person on the planet (I ran a marathon last year in 4 hours 2 minutes), but I don’t think I’m too slow. I just feel like some days I have good days (lots of sleep, it’s not 90% humidity out, etc.) and some days I have bad days and I should just trust my body to run. While training for my marathon last year I did speed work at the track once a week and timed that, but it was a different environment. I say go Garmin-less for a while and see how you like it. I found it to be quite freeing.

I don’t own a garmin…but I do always time and map my runs. I don’t ever look at my watch while running – I much prefer to run by feel. I simply start it when I leave and stop it when I get home. I also never run with music. I think that helps with listening to how my body is feeling. I’ve thought about getting a Garmin or other GPS watch, but then usually end up deciding the google maps is just as easy to map out mileage 🙂

I always use my polar watch to monitor time and heart rate. I feel like it’s the smartest way to workout. Sometimes I feel like I’m going a good pace, but then I see my heart rate is lower than zone 3 or my AT and I know I need to speed up to get the most benefit out of my workout. Without it I’m not sure if I’m in the right zone even if I feel like I’m exerting enough energy. When I heart rate train I improve so much faster, and am able to tell I’m improving, than when I’m not.

I like knowing my distance via Garmin. The problem I have with pace is comparing myself to other people. My “fast” 5K is 36 minutes. Which makes me feel like a loser sometimes.

I’d been interested in being able to focus on my own pace rather than others. For a new runner who is still trying to figure out her ability, it’s kinda rough. :-/

I like running by feel. I either run for time or distance (and we’re talking 30 minutes or up to a 5k, not hours or tons of miles), and in both cases, I use an app (Map My Run or now RunKeeper) to keep posted on my time/distance. I always look at my pace at the end, and I do see improvement over time, but focusing on it during a run stresses me out too much, and I actually end up performing worse. In a typical week-day run, when I’m just trying to hit 30 full minutes, I will challenge myself to run for at least three songs straight, and if I’m still feeling good, I’ll do one more at a time. Then I challenge myself to walk for only one, though I’ll keep walking for another one or two if I need to. That’s my version of running by feel. Oh, and my playlist of late has been the Elvis station on Pandora. It keeps me motivated.

I know- garmins can be mean. 🙂 And I had Ryder two weeks prior to Henry. 🙂

I would make a game plan of what days each week you are running or what type of runs you want to get in each week. If your running same pace each day it’s not going to make you faster- sure you know this.

So, I went from 11s with prego running down to 9:50-45 when I started and then down more to around 845s on speed days.

I just had Tuesdays as speed, W – cross-train or off, Thurs – tempo – warm up at 1 or 2 miles and then tempo 2 with cool down, Fri.-off, Sat. long run and Sunday – No Watch – 3-5 miles shakeout run.

This helped me get my pace for a 3 mile run from a 9:40 to 8:54 in 6 weeks. Speed and endurance are rough to get back though after baby. Baby has been sick this week and/or growth spurt and I haven’t run at all because I got sick. Good luck!!!