Swimming with Garmin 910xt

image from Wiggle website

Loving my new watch.  I splashed out on a Garmin 910xt  it's a really great watch.  It does the lot, running, cycling, swimming, navigation, wireless load up to the brilliant Garmin Connect.  This post is about the fun I have been having trying it out in the pool.

Here is a swim I did today at Lunchtime:

400m in 9:19 using 90 calories.  I'm not sure how the calories are calculated but I'm not the most efficient of swimmers so I think this is a bit conservative.  Average strokes of 10 per length.  I swim in a 20 metre pool so this is one stroke every two metres.  My pace per 100m is 2:19.

This can be broken down further into the laps as shown below:

As you can see, my watch thinks I did two lengths Breaststroke (I didn't).  The times of the lengths are interesting to look at aswell as the pace per 100m.  SWOLF is Swim Golf and is made up of the time in seconds to complete a length plus the strokes you take.  A lower score is better but it will be different for different length pools so this would have been better if it was standardised.  The efficiency is the same time plus strokes standardised to a 25m pool so would be useful to have this but I suppose it gets complicated in a 20m pool.  As it happens, I do 99% of my swimming in the same pool.

The main thing I want to use this watch for is to track my training, keeping a record.  One fun feature of Garmin Connect is the compare activities option.

Here are three swims compared:

Again, interesting to compare.  The 640m swim looks like it was overall a better swim than the middle 400m swim.  The efficiency is the same, the pace and speeds are quicker.

The 910xt can also be used for open water swims so there will be no need for any more of these shenanigans using this technique.  Looking forward to some warmer weather.