Sullivan Striders
GPS

 
We have been fielding a lot of questions about course accuracy by GPS users. Use www.sullivanstriders.org/maps1.html to see if a race course in this calendar has been measured accurately.  All race directors are required to provide the USATF course certification number if they list their race as "certified".  Your time can be off by a lot if the course is not accurate. Test your GPS by running 5000 meters (twelve and a half laps) on a 400 meter track, staying one foot out from the inside curb (or line). Tracks of more than 200 meters are measured one foot out from the inside curb (line). See what your GPS measurement results are. Do this on three separate days and compare your results to each other and to the track that was professionally surveyed by civil engineers or surveyors. Also, have your GPS show a graphic of the route you ran on that track. You will not see the smooth oval path you ran. Instead, you will see a zig-zag pathway that the GPS erroneously recorded. When you run road race courses with tree cover, your GPS does not consistently get satellite data. (GPS receives and records data every 1-20 seconds; USATF measurement receives and records data every second, and is calibrated every time it's used, whereas GPS is not.) With tree cover, GPS assumes you went in a straight line from the last point it recorded. GPS does not measure accurately! See http://www.hamptonrockfest.com/hamptonhalf-GPS.html and http://www.sullivanstriders.org/brians_sites.htm for further information.  Just because someone spends $200 on a device does not mean it is accurate.

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