Cycling with the Garmin Forerunner 405

Monday, February 15th, 2010 at 4:42 pm

When you think of the Garmin Forerunner 405, or any forerunner watch for that matter, you immediately think of running as its main physical activity. This line of thinking is perhaps further supported by the name in which the runner is already mentioned. While you would not be wrong in thinking this way, the Garmin Forerunner is actually a very capable GPS powered watch even in other activities.

One of the activities other running where using the Garmin Forerunner 405 is ideal is cycling. You can connect the Garmin Forerunner 405 and its sensors to your bicycle and you could track your training progress just as if you were running.

Here are some of the things that you can notice or expect from the Garmin Forerunner 405 while you are cycling:

A very intuitive menu:

When it comes to running watches, or in this case, cycling watches, having an easy to use and intuitive menu is critical. After all, you want to be able to focus on your cycling and not be distracted by your running watch.

In this regard, the Garmin Forerunner 405 performs well. It has a very interesting method for selecting menus. There are two hard buttons on the right and four places on the bezel for menu selection. You then perform circular motion on the bezel to be able to select items from the menu. This intuitive method is like the one used for the popular music player called the iPod.

This is quite incredible because I just need a few gestures to be able to see the data that I need or change the functionality of the watch.

Difference with other cycling computers:

A difference that the Garmin Forerunner 405 has with other cycling computers is in the way that they would track your data.

Most cycling computers would usually rely on getting the circumference of your wheel to be able to get the distance travelled between two points. On the other hand, this Forerunner uses GPS technology to be able to compute your distance.

There is no trouble with either method since the difference is usually just around 1-2%. This is not bad at all when it comes to tracking data.

Virtual Partner:

One thing that you can find very nice with the Garmin Forerunner 405 is the virtual partner feature. The virtual partner screen shows an imaginary cycling buddy that can help keep you company or pace you while you do your activity.

The virtual partner can help give cyclists a visual representation of how you are progressing on your target times or distances. This is great when you are doing your solo runs, or do not have a “training buddy” to do your activities with.

As you can see from these features, the Garmin Forerunner 405 can perform quite well when you use them for cycling purposes. This just shows how varied the situations or activities wherein this GPS enabled running watch can help your training.

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