Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Workout apps not showing distance/speed while biking

DrewDaHilp1

DrewDaHilp1

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Mar 29, 2009
606
11,797
All Your Memes Are Belong to US
As the title says. Anyone else having this issue? Am I over looking something?
I had my phone with me as well running Strava during the ride.
I went several miles and my distance shows 0 and my workout time shows that it was only 26 minutes when it was actually 40 minutes.
 
DrewDaHilp1 said:
As the title says. Anyone else having this issue? Am I over looking something?
I had my phone with me as well running Strava during the ride.
I went several miles and my distance shows 0 and my workout time shows that it was only 26 minutes when it was actually 40 minutes.
Click to expand...

I have biked a few times (not long distances) but it has given me loads of data. Time, active calories, resting calories (stopped at red lights), speed, temp, distance.

I assume you actually hit start on the workout. I forgot to do this once.
 
tpouliot said:
I have biked a few times (not long distances) but it has given me loads of data. Time, active calories, resting calories (stopped at red lights), speed, temp, distance.

I assume you actually hit start on the workout. I forgot to do this once.
Click to expand...

Yes I hit start. While moving the time was increasing, however the distance and speed were flat lined.
 
DrewDaHilp1 said:
Yes they are. The location, time and route were correct on the Strava app.
Click to expand...

Users are saying in this forum, that if you run another app with gps , the watch can't pull gps data from iphone . Do you try to only run the workout app in your watch? To see if that is your problem... for future reference ;)
 
I ran workout with nothing else running on the phone, plus my Garmin Edge - they were pretty much spot on over 15 miles on the bike. I'm not sure whether the same can be said for running when it was 0.15m short on a 4m run (again with no phone app running).
 
Andy in Embsay said:
I ran workout with nothing else running on the phone, plus my Garmin Edge - they were pretty much spot on over 15 miles on the bike. I'm not sure whether the same can be said for running when it was 0.15m short on a 4m run (again with no phone app running).
Click to expand...

I don't know, being 15 centimeters off on a 4 meter run seems okay to me :)
 
  • Like
Reactions: SMacDuff
cai4651 said:
Users are saying in this forum, that if you run another app with gps , the watch can't pull gps data from iphone . Do you try to only run the workout app in your watch? To see if that is your problem... for future reference ;)
Click to expand...

I can confirm this. It is because you had Strava running also. One or the other i am afraid.
 
I'm not convinced the outdoor run workout uses GPS at all - admittedly based on one run - but it was a known distance with a Garmin on the other arm. The AW was 0.15 miles short.
 
Andy in Embsay said:
I'm not convinced the outdoor run workout uses GPS at all - admittedly based on one run - but it was a known distance with a Garmin on the other arm. The AW was 0.15 miles short.
Click to expand...

Could that be due to the path you've taken on the route?
 
cai4651 said:
Users are saying in this forum, that if you run another app with gps , the watch can't pull gps data from iphone . Do you try to only run the workout app in your watch? To see if that is your problem... for future reference ;)
Click to expand...


I suspected this but def highly unlikely. Apps pulls GPS data from core location APIs. If you read apple dev docs, multiple apps can poll this API. The OS determines how often to call the GPS radio for a new position which eats battery life. If two apps request access close together, core location will just feed the same data to the second app.

However, what I have discovered is that you may need to have the motion activity and distance location service on for the watch to use GPS. This is how the Nike+ app used to work which apple codeveloped. If that is not on, go to privacy - location services - system services and turn it on
 
lchlch said:
Could that be due to the path you've taken on the route?
Click to expand...

Nope. I had a Garmin one one wrist and the AW on the other.

I did another run with Strava running - it measured 4.5m exactly (a route I know is 4.5m) - the watch measured 4.15m.

----------
dhy8386 said:
However, what I have discovered is that you may need to have the motion activity and distance location service on for the watch to use GPS. This is how the Nike+ app used to work which apple codeveloped. If that is not on, go to privacy - location services - system services and turn it on
Click to expand...

It's always been on on my phone.

----------
dhy8386 said:
However, what I have discovered is that you may need to have the motion activity and distance location service on for the watch to use GPS. This is how the Nike+ app used to work which apple codeveloped. If that is not on, go to privacy - location services - system services and turn it on
Click to expand...

It's always been on on my phone.
 
It's Strava's fault. I did a 30 mile ride over the weekend. Halfway through I stopped to make sure the info showing on the watch was also syncing to Strava. Not sure what happened, but both the Watch and iPhone app immediately zeroed out and I lost half my ride.

For the second half of my ride, I used the Watch's exercise app and Strava independently only on my iPhone (removed it from the Watch to avoid any problems). Both measured the ride effectively, so I'm pretty sure you don't have to choose between the two.

One other thing, and this may just be a bug, but it seems like the official Watch exercise app is able to "take over" when you are in the middle of working out, so that when you tilt your Watch it shows not the watch face, but your exercise progress. As far as I can tell, third party apps can't do this (when I tilt to see my Strava progress, it instead shows the watch app). I know there is a setting to always show the last used app, but I would rather keep the default behavior.

This is probably a Strava Watch app deal-breaker for me, as I'd rather not take both my hands off the bike to check my Strava progress. On the other hand, I really enjoyed using the Watch exercise app; having my current speed available motivated me to push myself and break some Strava records (running on my phone).
 
Okay so I found the fix for this after calling Apple yesterday. You have to have motion calibration and distance on your iPhone . It's under settings-privacy-system services-toggle the motion calibration and distance switch.
 
DrewDaHilp1 said:
Okay so I found the fix for this after calling Apple yesterday. You have to have motion calibration and distance on your iPhone . It's under settings-privacy-system services-toggle the motion calibration and distance switch.
Click to expand...

privacy -> location -> system services

That's where the map of everywhere the phone has ever been is, too.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back