Just two weekends left to ride new trails with your GPS for a chance to win the GoPro mountain bike helmet camera. GoPro was kind enough to send us two of these babies and we’ve been using ours out on the local trails and having a blast! The second place prize is sweet as well – 24 Solo DVD plus a singletracks t-shirt – but trust us, you’ll prefer the first prize

This week saw aabiking pull into first place with 10 points but AWooten2 is close behind with 9 points. There’s still time to map new trails or to pull together your GPS track files – contest ends June 1!

As you probably already know we’re big fans of taking our GPS on the mountain bike trail, especially for keeping track of distance and climbing and for mapping new singletrack. This week we read about a couple more ways folks are using GPS units with their bikes we thought you might find interesting…

• A new bike shop in Minneapolis has outfitted their fleet of 70 rental bikes with GPS units pre-loaded with local bike routes.  Not only does this seem like a great service for out-of-towners but it could also be a great way for locals to try out the latest GPS units and bikes while pedaling familiar trails.
• The Great Western Bike Rally is taking place this weekend in Paso Robles, CA and features an event you may not be familiar with: the geo-cache ride. GPS geeks are familiar with geo-caching – an activity that uses GPS to find hidden “treasures” in unusual locations – and geo-cache rides combine geo-caching with cycling to add a new dimension to the fun.

If you don’t already have a GPS for the trail, this summer may be a great time to consider one, especially when once that federal stimulus check arrives Check out our mountain bike GPS buyers guide to find the right GPS unit for you!

As if carrying your iPhone on the MTB trail wasn’t geeky enough, now you can CHARGE your iPhone on the trail using only the wind rushing over your handlebars: Meet the HY Mini Wind Turbine. Just attach the HY Mini to your bike and as long as your speed relative to the wind is over 19mph for 20 minutes you’ll get enough juice to power your iPod for 30 minutes. You’ll get power at speeds as slow as 9mph but I’m guessing that might be a losing proposition (20 minutes of pedaling just to get 10 minutes of iPod just doesn’t seem so great).

I know I take a fair amount of tech out on the mountain bike trail but I’m generally pretty careful to make sure everything (GPS, phone, camera) is charged up before I head out. The HY Mini could really come in handy in an emergency though – ya know, just in case you lose the trail and that 4 hour epic ride becomes an overnighter

I’ve been using an Edge 605 GPS on loan from Garmin for the past couple weeks and I’m finally ready to share my review. For my tests I took the 605 on the trails at Yellow River, Tribble Mill, and Big Creek, the mean roads of East Decatur and Stone Mountain, and dizzying loops through the neighborhood. It’s a good thing I was able to get in so many rides – the Edge 605 actually has a steep learning curve.

Mapping

The latest Edge series GPS units from Garmin were created to add a critical feature missing in the original Edge units: decent mapping. The Edge 605 includes a brilliant color screen that is easy to read in virtually any light conditions from mid-day sun to pitch dark night. The included basemaps may be a draw for some but beware: the included maps are woefully inadequate even for road riders (and even more worthless to mountain bikers). If you want to use the Edge 605 to view topographic or even detailed street maps you’ll need to add a microSD memory card plus a $100 (each) mapping software package from Garmin.

I found the maps difficult to focus on while riding, particularly on the mountain bike trail. Even harder is picking out your skinny dotted breadcrumb trail on the map, even when you stop to rest! I found myself staring at the GPS like Mr. Magoo at trail intersections, trying to figure out if I had been there already. The GPSMap 60Cx at least lets you choose a color for your breadcrumb trail to make it stand out on the map more – perhaps Gamin will add this feature to the 605 as a software update.

Loading trails

Garmin is slowly but surely making it easier for regular folks to download trail information online and load it onto their GPS before heading out to the trail but the process still hasn’t been perfected. When you connect the Edge 605, your computer automatically recognizes the GPS unit’s internal memory as a flash drive (even on your Mac!). Just navigate to the Garmin/GPX folder and plop that .GPX trail file on the device. Done. You can also check in the History folder to find your latest rides saved in individual .TCX files, perfect for importing into Garmin Training Center or posting online.

I was a bit surprised, however, to find that the Edge 605 doesn’t come with any software out of the box. It seems like Garmin wants you to use the free but extremely limited Training Center software or one of their (paid) websites like MotionBased. For mapping and loading trails I really prefer MapSource but like I mentioned earlier, it doesn’t come cheaply. I’m waiting for the day when GPS software is as easy to use as iTunes – just drag and drop your tracks from your trail library to your GPS. Anyone listening out there?

Following routes

One of the coolest things about the Edge 605 and 705 is the ability to follow routes created by others. Once you’ve loaded a GPX file onto your device, it’s simple to build a route based on the data. So, for example, if you’re riding the local trail and following a track you downloaded from singletacks, the GPS will begin directing you as you approach the next turn. Though it won’t talk to you like TomTom, two sharp beeps alert you while the screen shows the time-until-turn and a blown up map of the turn or intersection. Unfortunately the on-screen instructions are a bit hard to understand, especially bombing down a hill, when they say go “South” or “South-west” instead of a simple left or right. Fortunately the on screen graphics help clear up any confusion.

Other features

Of course the Edge 605 can do most of the things regular GPS units can do like keep track of distance traveled, speed, time, etc. but curiously some pretty important features were left out. For example, the Edge 605 doesn’t include a graphical elevation plot and can’t even give you a running tally of total climb/descent on the trail – unacceptable in my opinion. The Edge 605 does actually track these things and you can view them at home on your computer, so why isn’t this visible on the device?

The Edge 605 uses the same solid, sleek mounting system as the Edge 205 and 305 GPS units which means it will stay on your bike even on the roughest trails. The unit itself is a bit larger than the Edge 305 but it’s still quite small and a huge improvement over the GPSMap 60C in terms of size and usability on the bike. Satellite reception was good, though it seemed a bit slower to acquire and hold a signal than my trusty Edge 305.

If you’re confused about operating your Edge 605, I must warn you that the official online documentation is a joke. As I mentioned this GPS has a steep learning curve, even for a geek like me who has owned 9 different GPS models over the past 7 years. The owner’s manual is painfully basic and probably covers less than half the features included on the Edge 605.

Verdict

Overall I have to give the Edge 605 a check minus. Sure, it’s a good first stab at creating a cycling-specific color screen GPS but it falls short in so many areas, particularly when it comes to mountain biking. In terms of price the Edge 605 is out of reach for most casual riders starting at just under $400 for the GPS without any maps or memory cards. Based on the price and current feature set I’d only recommend the Edge 605 to early adopters – you know, those guys who lined up to get the first iPhone, only to see the prices drop and performance improve just a few months later. If you need a GPS for biking right now, you still can’t do any better than the Edge 305 in my opinion.

There are just 4 weekends before the end of the GPS trail contest here on singletracks and the competition for the GoPro Helmet HERO camera is getting intense! AWooten2 is out front with 9 maps and aabiking is close on his heels with 6 complete maps. If you’ve got a GPS and you like to mountain bike (don’t we all) then you really don’t have an excuse – get out on the trail and start mapping for your chance to win a sweet helmet cam!

I’m testing an Edge 605 GPS from Garmin right now and while I’m not ready to write a full review, I did want to share a cool feature you might not have heard about. With the newest cycling GPS units from Garmin it’s easier than ever to import trails downloaded from the Internet (like those offered on singletracks.com) – and you can even do it with your Mac!

Just plug in your Edge 605 or 705 with the included USB cable and most computers will automatically recognize the GPS as a flash drive. Copy your GPX formatted trail files (like this one) to the Garmin/GPX folder and you’re done – the trails will now show up in the Where To? -> Saved Rides list on your GPS. Too easy… In the old days you had to convert your GPX files to a Garmin format (depending on what kind of unit you had) and then transfer the file using clunky Garmin software or buggy third party programs. I’m glad Garmin finally got it right on the latest GPS units.

Speaking of mountain bike trail maps for your GPS – did you know singletracks now has more than 400 trails mapped and available online? The maps aren’t just for your GPS either – you can view and print the full color maps and elevation profiles as well. Our goal is to have 500 mountain bike trail maps online before the end of the summer and we can use your help! Just submit 3 new trail maps and you’ll get access to the entire map catalog – plus you could win a free GoPro Helmet HERO mountain bike helmet camera in our current GPS contest. Gnarly!

If you’ve been reading the blog or checking out the site you already know I love to mix electronics and mountain biking. For years I’ve been riding with a digital camera and GPS and now I’m even getting into the whole helmet cam scene with the GoPro HERO. I suppose the website is pretty high tech as well, though there isn’t any way to bring singletracks.com out on the trail with me … or is there?

USBfever.com is promoting an iPhone bike mount that lets you take your fancy Apple hardware out on the trail with you. Just think – you can make calls, surf web pages, and even snap pics of the ground while your iPhone stays firmly attached to your handlebars. I suppose this will be even better once the next generation iPhone is released since it is rumored to include GPS – delicious. And don’t forget to upgrade to a singletracks premium membership so you can view your trail maps while you ride via iPhone Matters.

In other mountain bike tech news, it was just last week that I wrote about the E+ electric mountain bike but it turns out there is a much sweeter electric ride available: the OB1 from Optibike. The OB1 seems to get about the same speed and range as the E+ but in a much cooler carbon fiber wrapper and smokin’ orange paint job (though I’m not sure why this photo looks like it was taken in the 80s). If you thought the E+ was expensive at around $4,000, the OB1 will absolutely blow your mind at $13,000. For a bike. That is powered by batteries. Hurry though, only 24 will be made this year! via Groovy Green.

It’s been a while since we held a contest here but we think you’ll agree it has been worth the wait. Submit your GPS tracks between April 1, 2008 and June 1, 2008 for a chance to win a new GoPro Helmet HERO helmet camera along with some other great prizes. The official contest rules and prize info is below; check here for more info along with the current standings.

First prize
Brand new GoPro Helmet HERO helmet camera PLUS 2Gb SD card! Special thanks to GoPro camera for this killer prize.

Second prize
24 Solo DVD PLUS an official singletracks t-shirt.

Third prize
Your pick from the singletracks.com schwag bag.

* All first-time GPS data submitors will receive free singletracks mountain bike stickers. All members who submit 3 or more GPS tracks will receive also a 10-year Pro subscription. Prizes and rules are subject to change.

Contest rules and instructions

1. Submit your new and original GPS tracks here.
2. Only submissions received from Tuesday, April 1 – Sunday, June 1 2008 will be considered.
3. Submissions must be approved before they are awarded a point value. Complete tracks count 1 point, partial tracks recieve 0.5 points.
4. The top 3 winners will be selected based on point totals. In the event of a tie, past submissions will be counted to determine the standings.
5. All first-time GPS trail data submitors will receive singletracks mountain bike stickers

I just received an email from Amazon.com saying the Garmin Edge 705 is FINALLY available for purchase. Unfortunately they aren’t giving these babies away but at least Amazon knocked $173 bucks off the MSRP

I hate to admit this but lately I’ve been more of a runner than a mountain biker. I mean, I still get out on the bike as often as possible but it’s so much easier to go for a quick run than to pack the bikes and drive to the nearest dirt. As a nice side effect the running has actually put me in great shape aerobically so when I do hit the trails I can climb like a spider monkey. But I digress.

Last month I picked up a Garmin Forerunner 205 to keep track of my runs but I was also curious about how it handled on the bike – after all the Forerunner is marketed as a multi-sport device. My experience with the first generation Forerunner was less than positive on the bike and I really wanted to give Garmin another chance. In this case it turns out a few years and some serious design modifications have made all the difference in the world.

The first question most folks have about a GPS watch is, “how big is it?” The Forerunner 205 certainly isn’t dainty but even mudhunny has been wearing it on her marathon training runs and her wrist is about as thick as a #2 pencil. You won’t be making any fashion statements on the trail (other than “geek”) with this watch but obviously that’s not the point. I even found the watch to be comfortable on the mountain bike in pretty much every position I could think of. On bumpy singletrack I hardly even noticed it was there.

With the first generation Forerunner there were serious issues with satellite reception, especially in thick tree cover. I’m happy to report that I didn’t notice any loss of reception on the local mountain bike trail despite some pretty tight conditions. The resulting map seemed pretty clear with very little overlap on parallel trails. The Garmin Training Center software also did a good job smoothing the elevation plot and random spikes were fairly minimal for such tough conditions.

The map screen on the Forerunner 205 is passable but you really can’t use it for any kind of meaningful trail navigation. I suppose if you were REALLY lost and needed to backtrack you might be able to rely on the navigation screen but otherwise don’t count on it being all that helpful. In promos for the Forerunner 205 I’ve been photos of some sort of elevation plot screen but I haven’t been able to find it myself – a major disappointment for sure. The tiny screen and awkward wrist angle make it difficult to view while riding so you’ll need to be careful when tracking your in-ride progress.

One feature I found almost by accident is the ability to switch between activities mid-workout– like if you were running a duathalon for example. Under the ‘settings’ screen you can specify your current activity – running, cycling, or ‘other’ – and the data fields are adjusted accordingly (pace for running, speed for cycling for example). When you switch mid-workout the watch resets and tracks each sport separately for you to analyze on the computer later. Nice.

Of course the Forerunner 205 also has all the features you’d expect from a GPS device – an odometer, speedometer, stopwatch, virtual training partner, etc. The only difference between the 205 and the more expensive Forerunner 305 is the 305 includes a wireless heart rate monitor for the truly serious athletes. For most mountain bikers this isn’t that important so I say skip it and save yourself some coin.

The Forerunner 205 is a solid choice if you’d like a single device to use for mountain biking and running. While it won’t help you find your way on the trail it will help you track your workouts and perhaps give you the motivation to ride a little faster.

I picked up my Forerunner 205 for just under $150 at Amazon.com. Amazon really has the lowest prices I’ve been able to find on GPS devices anywhere, check them out today! 

Well, I did it. I finally got my first GPS with a color screen. This is GPS #8 for me and I thought I’d share some of my impressions for those of you considering the Garmin GPSMap 60Cx for mountain biking. My last GPS review was of the Garmin Edge 305 where I proclaimed that the 305 was THE BEST GPS for mountain biking ever. In that light, this review will compare the GPSMap 60Cx with the Edge 305 to see how it stacks up on the trail.

The first difference you’ll notice between the GPSMap 60Cx and the Edge is size; the GPSMap is roughly 2 times larger than the Edge. Presumably this is because the GPSMap is packed with more features and a more powerful antenna (which, I might add, protrudes in a very obvious way). The bike mount for the GPSMap is bulky and in my experience it tends to allow the GPS to rattle on bumpy trails. The Edge? Quiet as a mouse.

Another obvious difference between these GPS devices is the color screen. As I mentioned earlier, this is my first GPS with a color screen and I gotta say, it will be hard to go back to black and white. The color screen makes following tracks and finding waypoints much, much easier and gives the contrast you need to see things like topo lines and roads. Speaking of topo lines, the GPS 60Cx has them (with additional software) while the Edge 305 doesn’t. For navigation the GPSMap wins hands down.

In terms of accuracy, I had heard that the GPSMap 60Cx was less accurate on the trail than the Edge 305 but I only noticed this in terms of the elevation data collected. As you can see from the map below created in TopoFusion (Edge track in blue, GPSMap in red) there is little difference in 2D plotting but in 3D, the GPSMap was horribly inaccurate. This is mostly due to the fact that the GPSMap 60Cx doesn’t include a barometric altimeter which the 60CSx adds for an additional $50 or so. Not only is the GPSMap 60Cx inaccurate when recording elevation, it doesn’t even show you an elevation plot on screen (that I could find anyway). Nope, you’ll need to download data to your computer to view this–unacceptable in my opinion.

Lastly, I’ll mention some issues with using the TracBack feature on the GPSMap 60Cx. First off, Garmin limits tracks to just 500 points so if you’re transferring a MTB track you downloaded from singletracks that has more than 500 points, you’ll need to trim it down to fit the entire ride on your GPS. Luckily MapSource software has a feature to help you do this but it’s not intuitive and it leads to the loss of some trail detail. On the plus side, the color screen gives you the ability to choose a color for your track lines (I like red myself) so it’s easy to distinguish from your own track log and various roads, topo lines, etc. It even gives you some turn-by-turn cues as well, very cool when navigating an unfamiliar trail.

So while the color screen and ability to import maps to the GPSMap 60Cx is great, I think I’ll stick with my Edge 305 when I’m on the MTB trail. Look for the forthcoming Edge 705 to combine the superior usability of the 305 with a color screen and mapping capabilities, it could very well be the perfect GPS for mountain biking!

With the ongoing intersection of technology and mountain biking there have been some recent efforts to quantify and compare mountain bike trails. While the idea may sounds strange, some interesting progress has been made.

The International Bike Parameters Index (IBP Index) “is an index that values the difficulty of a mountain bike route or a road bike route” using GPS data collected on the bike. For example, you can upload your GPS data from a ride and the IBP Index will calculate things like distance and the grade along the route. I tried the index for a few rides with mixed results and I concluded the usefulness really depends on the quality of your GPS data. TopoFusion includes two similar indices for GPS tracks, one called the “difficulty index,” and the other the “effort index.” While the numbers don’t mean anything when taken by themselves, they are useful to compare across rides to get an idea of relative difficulty.

Here on singletracks we’ve even taken a stab at quantifying the technical aspects of mountain biking. Using the IMBA trail difficulty rating system we give members the chance to rate the technical difficulty of mountain bike trails around the world. Those ratings are then aggregated leading to an average or consensus rating for each trail. Such a rating would be difficult to compile without software and the distributed nature of the internet – yet another way technology is helping quantify MTB trails.

In the end though, no amount of technology or group polling will ever fully quantify a mountain bike trail. Even if you could take things into account like scenery, tread, and the like, could a number ever really communicate what it’s like to ride a mountain bike trail? It would be like trying to compare your friends – sure some friends are better than others but really they’re just different and you like them each for different reasons. Instead of relying on a rating, why not get out and ride for yourself – you might just be surprised at what you find!