MBlog

Dot Races

Aah, more Dot Races...can there every be too many?
The past month produced some beauties, too good to pass up.

Sea Otter Classic - our mapping effort and marketplace presence were a success. It was great to  meet some familiar dots and create a few new ones. The dirt in our laptops and monitors was a bummer, compressed-air to the rescue...See the updated Sea Otter Page to view results and Dot Races. Check out the pros on MB!

Boston Marathon - MB customers were in full force. Congratulations to all and thanks for sharing your race.

With so many dots to choose from, it wasn't easy to choose only five. I tried to include those with the most interesting digests. If you're an MB Standard customer, you can click the usernames and view digests...

Dot	Username	MB Time
Red	laurel	4:26:48
Blue	offroadtri	4:03:05
Beige	scrat71	3:53:47
Green	jhawktdc	3:25:01
Yellow	j81davey	2:59:51

Below dot race is viewable in Internet Explore with SVG Viewer plug-in.

Sea Otter Classic

Planning to attend Sea Otter? We'll see you there.                        

We joined forces with the Sea Otter Classic to provide detailed course mapping and analysis. If you haven't already, you can preview the courses on MotionBased. We also built rotating 3-D maps to provide a rich view of the terrain and landscape.   

The MotionBased crew will be there in full force. Look for the MB booth in the marketplace. We'll be running demos, talkin' shop, and peddling goods. If you're thinking about upgrading or want to get a friend on MB, come by and learn more about the show special on MB Subscriptions and Forerunner 301s.

Don't forget to bring your GPS device. It's going to be a Dot Racing bonanza!!

See ya there,

The MB Crew

True Love

Carol and I went on a run last night instead of deploying the official European release that many of you have been asking for:) Check it out...

The weather turned really cold so the moment required two of us working together to actually get out for a run.  Knowing the weather was so brisk we turned our Forerunner 301 units on in the car as we drove to the trail-head.  This way we knew our signal would be acquired and we could hop out of the car and get busy.

Luckily our individual Heart Rates were found correctly inside the car.  Keep in mind that your 301 will keep the same heart rate strap during the entire activity, but during HR acquisition it is important to be away from any other 301 heart rate strap, otherwise you may end up with someone elses biometrics.

Tennessee Valley is mostly open skies and makes for a good GPS run, but from where we started the trees were thick and the valley was narrow. The GPS reported a signal outage right away.  Losing signal at the beginning of an activity can be a bummer since this may cause the biggest loss of distance.  MB may not know that you actually started where you did and just assume the run started where the signal was acquired.   If you lose signal in the middle of an activity we know that you must have gotten from point A to B somehow so we assume at least a straight line distance. 

We continued and the GPS gained signal again.  The remainder of the run was in the open valley towards the ocean and back.  In the parking lot near the stables we had the choice of running on the fun trail away from the road or actually on the road itself. 

I don't know about everyone else, but I really don't like to run on the road.  Running on the trail is much more interesting jumping over logs and creeks.  Carol usually feels the same way, but when we were faced with choosing the trail or the road...she asked to return on the road.  I had to ask why because I know her usual preference.  She responded:

"Well, if we run down the trail we might lose signal again."

I mean, is true love or what?.  Thinking of the GPS signal quality over our own preference of the terrain!  Don't worry, we chose the trail. I am a GPS geek, but there is a limit.  She probably just didn't want to get her shoes muddy and knew she had a better chance of convincing me if she mentioned the GPS rather than her gear.  In a way, knowing how to manipulate your loved ones into following your own preference is true love too.

So the moral of the story is to not let the GPS determine your workout.  Choosing to run outside instead of on the treadmill is an acceptable reason to have the GPS modify your workout plans, but always choose the path that best fits your desires, not the limitations of the GPS.  Let us figure out how to make the GPS work better in your terrain. 

Simply remember to help out with those items that you can control.  Let your GPS and HRM warm up before you start your activity, make sure your battery is charged, moisten your heart rate strap, acquire heart rate away from other FR 301 units...leave the rest up to MotionBased and Garmin.  We're constantly trying to make it all better.

Aaron

 

Map Player Zoom

Betcha didn't know that you can zoom in/out on the Map Player?

Now. This isn't your typical zoom feature on popular web-based maps (Yahoo Maps, Mapquest, Google Maps). So, don't get too excited.

But, you do have the ability to zoom in on a specific area of the Map Player to get a closer view of the route make-up. If you get close enough, you can actually see the track points that define the route and the metrics for each activity -- these little buggers are what make MB tick.

Here's how you can start zooming:

1. Select activity from Digest
2. Click on the Map Player tab
3. Hover mouse over the spot you'd like to zoom in on
   
4. Right-click mouse or use a keyboard shortcut
   
5. Keep zooming in until you see tiny arrows that represent each track point
   
6. And if you use the Player Control while zoomed in, you can actually watch your dot move from point to point
   
7. Right-click the map to return to the original view
   

That's it. You're now equipped to be an MB zooming fiend. Have fun with it -- and learn from it.  You can understand a lot more about how we make our calculations when seeing the source. It may tempt you into practicing "good GPS reception" habits.

The better the GPS signal, the better the track points, the better the MB data.  And that makes you happier, which -- ultimately -- makes the world a better place :)