Summer is a great time for outdoor activities as well as for jogging. Running strengthens the cardiovascular system, burns calories, increases endurance and overall muscle tone. An indispensable assistant in running is a smart watch, and the updated Garmin Coach function, available in the free Garmin Connect app, will replace the running coach.
Whether it’s a 5k run for beginners or a half-marathon for advanced athletes, it pays to plan your workouts – distance, pace, recovery time. Garmin Coach allows you to choose a plan and get a dynamic online workout tailored to your personal physique. Three plan options, suitable for entry-level and intermediate athletes, are designed to prepare you for your target distance of 5km, 10km or 21km, from running/walking mode to tempo values of around 4 min/km.
Garmin Coach lets you choose an authoritative coach to help you reach your goals. That could be Olympic gold medalist and best-selling author Jeff Galloway, psychologist and online running coach Greg McMillan, or physician and running expert Amy Parkerson-Mitchell. The virtual coach will then send the user a free adaptive workout plan with step-by-step instructions tailored specifically to the chosen tasks. Videos and tips from the virtual coach, progress messages received through Garmin Connect, and in-depth articles on nutrition and running form are available during your workout.
Exercise syncs with your Garmin watch, which adjusts your workout plan based on your progress and efforts. If it’s too easy to train, the watch will track your heart rate and other parameters, and the plan will be adjusted to increase the intensity. A personal trainer will also account for skipping a workout and help you continue.
This feature is available for several Garmin watch lines. Vivoactive 3 is an everyday smartwatch with an optical heart rate monitor and built-in GPS. The family of sports smart watches Forerunner designed for professional-level athletes, the watch monitors a number of dynamic parameters, to evaluate the physiological parameters of the athlete, in particular VO2 max, aerobic and anaerobic effect of exercise, recovery time. The Garmin Coach is available for Forerunner 45, 245/245 Music, 645/645 Music, 935 and 945 models. Fenix family is a line of popular smart watches for sports and tourism, combining the functionality of a multisport watch and navigator. Garmin Coach feature available for Fenix 5 and 5 Plus models.
Garmin emphasizes that the updated Garmin Coach personal trainer feature is free and exclusive.
How effective is the Garmin Coach feature in providing personalized training guidance and motivation for users? Does it cater to different fitness levels and goals?