I love technology, always and forever!

OK, bonus points for identifying the quote above. I am a big fan of technology. I always have been. I love playing with gadgets and always seem to want the latest and greatest electronics items, which is a bit of a problem as I have a negative income right now. This carries over to my workouts as well: I have no less than four, yes four, heart rate monitors right now: a really old probably doesn't even work model, a Polar s210 that I use on the track and sometimes on the bike, a Ciclosport HAC4 on the road bike, and the ultimate runner's gadget: a Garmin ForeRunner 305.

Depending on how you look at it, the 305 is either a small computer that is strapped to your wrist, or an oversized watch, made to look all the more ridiculous by my very thin petite wrists. Packed inside of this unit is a stopwatch with all the usual functions, a heart rate monitor (linked to a chest strap), and a GPS unit, which is what really makes this unit magic. With the integrated GPS you can see while you are running how far you have gone, how fast you are currently going, and your average speed. There are also features allowing mapping and other fancy stuff that I haven't gotten into. I love not having to know where I am heading before I start a run, although I still pre-plan my long runs on MapMyRun or Gmap-Pedometer to make sure that I don't have to run around the block ten times at the end to get the distance in. It is also nice to know how fast (or slow) I am going, especially since I don't have a great sense of pacing yet.

Once you finish the workout, the 305 can be connected to the computer and all of the data can be uploaded to training software. This makes tracking your workouts very easy as all you have to do is add comments like "my legs felt like lead today" or "man, I am quick like a bunny!" A few sites have gone a step further and allow full mapping of your workouts along with the display of all data at any point on the map. I am currently using MotionBased for this purpose, and it is pretty much awesome. The site displays and graphs all of your information from heart rate, to speed and pace, to elevation, and can display all of this on a map with a little you running along. The site can also perform workout analysis, and if you use the same route multiple times, can overlay your workouts on eachother so you can see where you are faster and slower. If you haven't checked out any of my runs yet, head over to MotionBased, set up a free account, and then search for user "kluecke1". Those of you who enjoy playing with Google Maps and Earth will particularly like this. Those of you who enjoy stalking me (and why else are you reading my blog?) will have the added bonus of knowing where you can find me most of the time when I am out running.

Wow, rereading this I should see if I can get some sponsorship money from a few companies here. A reader base of around two probably won't work for them though....