Motion(X) sickness

I promise that I'll eventually stop complaining about the GPS functionality of the iPhone but this morning's experience made me wonder if the whole concept needs a few more years to develop into a viable technology. I got off to a good start today in terms of timing, I was dressed and ready to make it out the door by 4:00 AM. This was important because that extra ten minutes would give me more time to run and I really wanted to work on distance as I train for my August 23rd race. If I'd ignored the iPhone on my way out I would have been much better off since it added to my setup time and - therefore - took away from my run time. That would have been forgiven if the result was even remotely accurate but the GPS app did not come through. More on that later.

Yesterday, instead of doing my usual elliptical workout, I decided to work on my upper body that I've sorely neglected over the last month. I started with 20 minutes of arms-only elliptical and followed with 15 minutes of free weights. I didn't want to overdo it so I stopped there. I worked up quite a sweat in the process, something I'll attribute in equal parts to hard work and oppressive humidity. Today I was anxious to get back out on the road and after having a carb-rich lunch and small but well balanced dinner I woke up feeling ready. As I mentioned above I started a few minutes early and even with the extra work stuffing the iPhone into the armband I was outside stretching by 4:09 AM. I turned on the MotionX application and was disappointed, but not surprised, to see that the GPS wasn't acquired by the time I was ready to leave. I started off anyway and switched on the app knowing it would start tracking eventually.

I got a little confused along my course because so many of the streets look the same, especially in the pitch dark and saw that I was on a different street than I'd expected. I figured that the MotionX map would show me where I went wrong when I reviewed it post-run. I felt great and could have easily gone on well past my time imposed limit. I ended up covering 2.6 miles at a 9:09 pace. This was good considering that I wasn't really thinking about speed as I ran. The MotionX was completely off with the path showing me running through people's homes and across lawns and through back yards. I thought in the early morning there would be far fewer things that would interfere with the signal. While the Garmin (accurately) showed 2.6 miles traveled, the MotionX showed 2.09 miles. It did show me where I veered off onto a different street so at least it keeps a true, if sloppy, record of my course.