Garmin 301

This is the Garmin 301 Forerunner, a GPS watch and heart rate monitor. Sorry for the blurry view of the heart rate monitor. I'm not enough of a photographer to have two things in focus at the same time. I should have had Liz do the honors. Some of 301's features include total distance, pace, customizing laps by distance, elevation, etc. It's a very cool toy for the hardcore runner or cyclist.

This past Saturday, I used the 301 on my long run. It's a good thing I had it, as Liz wasn't able to drive me up past Armonk. I had to just leave the house and run willy nilly. I decided to head towards the east side (Mamaroneck, Rye, Harrison). I didn't really know where I was going as I'm unfamiliar with the east side. Let's just say that I'm the one who lives on the other side of the tracks and the east side is where people like to take pity on us west siders. I think they gave me a free turkey last year for Thanksgiving. God bless the east siders.

Well, I didn't really end up on the east side. I ended up in New Rochelle and when I tried to head east, I actually ended up going northwest to Scarsdale. The east side must have one of those leprechaun gates where you can only head east if you have a magic feather.

Scarsdale isn't bad, but I was only at the eight mile point. I had fourteen miles left. I didn't have a lot of choices, so I had to head to where I belong. That's right, White Plains. I ran all around White Plains, up many a hill until I hit the sixteen mile mark and I could return home with a twenty-two miler under my belt.

Here's just a glimpse of the output of the 301. Elevation, distance, and pace. You can click on any spot of the chart and it gives you precise information on each of these three measurements. It's sweet!

The green line is the elevation and the blue line is my pace. As you can tell, I went up and down a lot of hills. I'd see a hill and I'd charge up it. I call it my long strengthening run. All those hills contributed to a much slower than normal pace (8:31 avg), but that's ok, I feel much stronger today.

It also gives you a map of where you've been. I can see where I began heading in the wrong direction, but I swear I turned right at Wilmot. Stupid east side leprechauns.