Garmin Forerunner 405 Wireless GPS-Enabled Sport Watch with USB ANT Stick and Heart Rate Monitor (Black)

Sale Garmin Forerunner 405 Wireless GPS-Enabled Sport Watch with USB ANT Stick and Heart Rate Monitor (Black)

Garmin Forerunner 405 Wireless GPS-Enabled Sport Watch with USB ANT Stick and Heart Rate Monitor (Black) Feature

Garmin Forerunner 405 Wireless GPS-Enabled Sport Watch with USB ANT Stick and Heart Rate Monitor (Black)

Training features that continuously monitors your time, distance, pace, calories and heart rate (when paired with heart rate monitor)

ANT + Sport wireless platform wirelessly sends your data to your computer

Includes both the USB ANT Stick and Heart Rate Monitor

Download recorded courses to compete against previous workouts or race a Virtual Partner

Touch bezel lets you change screens with a simple tap (no more fumbling for buttons)

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Products Description

Training features that continuously monitors your time, distance, pace, calories and heart rate (when paired with heart rate monitor).ANT + Sport wireless platform wirelessly sends your data to your computer.Includes both the USB ANT Stick and Heart Rate Monitor.Download recorded courses to compete against previous workouts or race a Virtual Partner.Touch bezel lets you change screens with a simple tap (no more fumbling for buttons). The Power Of Location-Based Data Anyone who has used Garmin's Forerunner 205 or 305 already understands the power that attaching location data to traditional measurements like distance, speed, time, calories burned, and heart rate can provide. Knowing exactly where you worked hardest, ran fastest (or most slowly), and lets you tailor your workouts to improve for specific distances, conditions, and types of terrain. It gives a complete picture of how you interact with every portion of your run. With the Forerunner 405, Garmin has finally put the power of GPS location-based date into a sleek sport watch that can be worn all day. Runners no longer have to choose between function and fashion. Garmin's ANT + Sport wireless platform that wirelessly sends your data to your computer and a touch bezel that lets you change screens with a simple tap (no more fumbling for buttons) run make this not just a leap forward in GPS-enabled fitness devices, but in training devices period. Forerunner 405 comes in two color options — black or green.
Product Review! Garmin Forerunner 405 Wireless GPS-Enabled Sport Watch with USB ANT Stick and Heart Rate Monitor (Black)

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Garmin Forerunner 405 GPS Watch

2009 Update: Amazon does sell this now.



I recently misplaced my Forerunner 305 at home under mysterious circumstances. The timing of my loss was quite good because Garmin decided to release a new version of the Forerunner series around that time so I decided to get it. This is the first Garmin GPS watch that actually looks like a normal watch! (The others are moderately big and not as sleek.)



Amazon.com still doesn't sell it at this time, so I got it from REI.com. I ordered it online on 26 April, and the package arrived at my home in Singapore on 7 May via vPOSTUSA. vPOST seems to be getting better nowadays with a slicker reporting system and faster turnaround of around two weeks. (Click on all pictures below to see larger versions)

The second box contains the SB-800 flashlight from amazon.com. It's good to consolidate your vPOSTUSA purchases to save some money.

This morning I cycled around 37km along the PCN with Jan. The pictures below show the comparisons between the Cateye cycling computer which relies on the circumference of the wheel to get the distance travelled and the 405 which relies on the GPS satellites to do the same. As shown, the difference is about 200m over 37km, or around 1%. That's good enough for me!



This shows my heartrate; it's now 100 beats per minute. I didn't need to get the version that has the heartrate monitor because I can still use the one that came with my previous Forerunner 305.



This is the Virtual Partner screen. It's great for running when you don't have a running companion and just need an imaginery friend to keep you company or to pace you using some target timing or distance that you input into the watch.

The above two screens show the GPS satellites' accuracy. The SiRFstarIII chip is again found in the 405 according to wordings found on the box, so thick foliage shouldn't affect the signals too much.

This is a view of some of the various menu items that are available.

A very interesting feature of this watch is the way the menus are selected. I don't know of any other watch that uses this 'iPod' like way of selecting menus. There are only two hard buttons on the right, and four 'places' on the bezel to select the menus. To select 'menu', you just put your finger at six o'clock. To select items within the menus, just do circular motions on the bezel the same way you operate an iPod! It's quite incredible!



After you've jogged/cycled, the information is stored in the watch. To transfer the info into the computer, you plug this USB stick into to the computer, and the data will be synced wirelessly and automatically. This feature is powered by the very cool ANT+Sport technology!



After the data is downloaded, Garmin Training Centre will launch and you can look at the nice graphs.



There's a built-in battery and you can charge the 405 using your computer's USB port or the supplied wall adaptor. This charging clip attaches to the watch and charges it. (The 100-240v wall adaptor supplied has a plug for the US. If you aren't in the US, just use one of those industry standard plug for your region and fix it to the customisable plug.)



The design of the 405 is really very pretty. If you need to know how far you've run or cycled, there's no better buy than this. For more info, look at Garmin's website or their blog.



And oh, this is my road bike. :)

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Eastern Coastal Park Connector Network

The new 42km Eastern Coastal PCN for cyclists, runners, roller bladers and walkers just opened a few days ago, so this morning Jan and I went to check out the 'scenic coastal stretch' section of the PCN . The almost 8km of road that runs parallel to the airport runway is just fantastic! Too bad I didn't bring a camera. We started at the MacDonalds at East Coast Park, cycled to Changi Point Ferry Terminal, and back. The round-trip was 37.96km according to my GPS.

I think NParks is doing good things with this cycling path thing. I still dare not cycle on the roads, so more power to those bike path builders! (Click pictures below to enlarge.)

Data taken with a Garmin Foreunner 305. Conversion to Google Earth .gpx data done with TCX converter.

Source: Sunday Times, 16 December, 2007

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National Runway Cycling 2007

I wasn't aware that there was such a thing called Runway Cycling until last week, just days after I got the new road bike. It turns out that this is something that the Air Force organises every year. I'd not ridden a 45km 'endurance route' at one go before, so I worried that I might come in last or something. Still, cycling on an airport runway is probably one of the top 10 things I want to do before I die, so yeah...

It was a beautiful Sunday morning, the winds were just right. So now I know what's good about a road bike. I hadn't been training, but the 45km seemed relatively easy. (I wasn't really racing hard or anything.) I don't believe I can finish the route reasonably refreshed if I were to use the mountain bike I had earlier. Pedal, pedal... At the start, it was very crowded with thousands at the waiting line. But it got progressively less crowded, and that's when you become one with the runway, especially the white lane strips/centreline, which was just huge. Each loop below was 15km. Participants had to do the loop three times...

Distance covered reported by Garmin Forerunner 305: 43.99km (.gpx obtained with this TCX convertor.)
Distance covered reported by Cateye computer: 43.98km

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Pedal Ubin

I was at Pulau Ubin today with Chin and Yuhui for Pedal Ubin; my second Ubin trip in as many months. The tour was nice. It's one thing to cycle all around the island, it's quite another to cycle, stop and have interesting tidbits about the wildlife, trees, plants, flowers and so on explained to you by the guides.

We travelled on the left side of the island. After the tour ended, I continued north to look at the campsites at the beach as I'm thinking of doing some camping here soon...

GPS tracks obtained with the GPSMAP 60CSx

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My New Car / Trek 1000

The most inspiring cycling ad of all time! Higher resolution video here



When I was in Perth, I thought that it would be good to learn a new sport, so I picked up cycling and cycled almost everyday to school along a bike path that stretched for 7km. I didn't really have a top-of-the-line bike, just a mountain bike that I subsequently fitted with slick wheels and helped me travel more than 5500km over a few years.



I'm generally not very good at sports, because I think I have a hand-eye coordination problem if I do things like kick a football (I tend to miss) or try to receive a fast moving tennis ball (I duck.) So that leaves me with 'easier' sports like running, or cycling (which doesn't involve much; I just sit on a chair and do circular motions with my legs.) But cycling, to me at least, has a much higher return on investment. It's one of the more simpler sports that gives me great pleasure. To feel alive, for one thing. To enjoy the scenery. To have a sea gull fly in the same direction, and just floating on an air thermal meters away from me. To be attacked by a crazy bird. To have the wind push me. To Live Strong.



So I hadn't been cycling for a while, and thought that I should pick it up again. I also wanted to get a road bike this time because it's much more efficient. I narrowed down my choices to a Trek and a Giant. I wasn't really comfortable with the service I got from a Giant dealership, was too lazy to find a better dealer, so went for the former. The Trek dealer in Singapore, called Treknology, seems to have a good standard of service; the folks are not condescending to newbie buyers, willing to chat and explore options, patiently help the customers test drive, and generally are just nice. Their store in town has been renovated and it's lovely, but their other branch at Holland Grove is where I think is the better location to do test drives. There's a quaint 'car park in a garden' right in front of the store to do this.



So this is the new 2007 Trek 1000, and it costs SGD1100 without accessories and the clipless pedals that I added. Happy cycling!



Background reading: Where was my bike made? Trek History.

Dashboard: Light and Odometer/Speedometer/Cadence

Lance Armstrong is not only a great cyclist, but an instruction manual writer too.

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