Whether you’re shopping for a gift or getting acquainted with your new purchase, we want you to know as much as possible about the Garmin you’re checking out. That’s why we’re always adding more quick feature-specific tutorials to our online learning center. These helpful step-by-step videos bring to life the features and functions of Garmin’s products, to help you out before you hit the stores or after you’ve hit the power button. Our newest videos focus on the Dakota series of touchscreen handhelds, which are perfect for hiking, camping and geocaching with your family and friends. From acquiring GPS signals to navigating to your destination, Jake walks you through the process with vivid screenshots and scenic examples. And keep checking the learning center, because Oregon tutorials are right around the corner. 

But our learning center isn’t just for fans of flannel and fleece. Runners, cyclists and gym-goers can learn about the FR60 fitness watch, Forerunner 405′s GPS-based features or the various cycling options for Edge 705. Golfers can focus on improving their game with the touchscreen Approach G5 and its more than 10,000 preloaded courses. Pilots can reach new heights with information about flyGarmin, Pilot My-Cast and GPSMAP 696. Boaters and fishermen can find new depths with Garmin’s Marine Network. And businesspeople and travelers alike will appreciate the navigation options at their fingertips with nüvifone G60. But no matter your hobbies, we wish you all a safe and happy holiday season.

Energy, enthusiasm, intelligence and curiosity. That’s what local Boy Scouts brought to a Kansas City park the past couple weekends, and all I had to supply were some basic Garmin handhelds and a little know-how. OK, my know-how wasn’t even needed, because as soon as these youngsters got their hands on a GPS device, they were off and running. We recently supplied local troops with a few dozen lean and green Geko units – our tiny-yet-tough outdoor handhelds – as the Boy Scouts consider adding Geocaching as a merit category. If the past two weeks are any indication, they’ll be earning their badges in record time. Here are a few pictures taken Sunday, when the local NBC affiliate joined us as the Scouts learned about the Geko, the new touchscreen Dakota and the Oregon 550t with built-in camera – all while discovering limited-edition Garmin geocoins. As I mentioned on the air, I’m all for any activity that gets kids (and adults, for that matter) more engaged with the environment, education, recreation and technology. And the timing was perfect, as it gave me yet another reason to give thanks this holiday season that all of those elements add up to a good day at the office (or the park…).  

A lot of people ask me for freebies. Here you go: Go get your Garmin. Update the software right now. You’re at a computer – unless you’re reading this on your phone, in which case I’ll try to keep it short – so you don’t have any excuses. Even if you just bought your Garmin yesterday, had it for years or will be opening it a month from
now, our engineers may have been working on new software while it sat
on a shelf, in your house or under the tree. Updating your software through my.Garmin.com is free, it’s fast, it’s easy and it makes your Garmin even better than before without costing a dime. And with as much as our engineers are able to pack into a software update, it should really be called a product upgrade. 

Take, for example, this week’s news about Custom Maps. Simply by updating the software on your Garmin Oregon, Dakota or Colorado and following a few simple steps, you can now transform existing paper and digital maps into downloadable content to overlay onto your device. Visit garmin.com/CustomMaps to learn more about this process that maximizes the potential of your product. To get an idea of the other aspects that can be added or improved upon through software updates, check out the newest post at GPSFix.com. While it focuses on Custom Maps, the entry also rattles off the other new benefits of the latest software updates. And it’s not just outdoor handhelds that show how great products can be made even better. My fellow bloggers Carl and Peg have shown how recent software updates can improve the Approach G5 golf GPS or the Forerunner family of fitness watches. And many of these improvements are based on customer feedback, so whether you’re talking to clerks at a retail store, my colleagues at a trade show or me during a race (that’s how I passed a couple miles of the Chicago Marathon last month), your feedback is being heard. But enough from me, you’re supposed to be updating your software. You can thank me later.

As a fan of the movies “Rounders” and “Fight Club,” I was obviously thrilled with Garmin’s decision to support the Maasai Wilderness Conservation Trust and its Maasai Marathon team, a group of 30 runners led by conservationist/Oscar nominee Edward Norton and three Maasai warriors, who ran the ING New York City Marathon. As a Garmin employee, I was excited to be a part of such a great global effort by helping the MWCT promote conservation, education and health services within the Maasai community. And as a runner, I was jealous that I wouldn’t be running with Edward through the five boroughs of New York, where last year I loved my 26.2-mile tour. Fortunately, there’s Garmin Connect to help me (and everyone around the world) feel like I was there with Edward and his Maasai friends.

“What a day. Went great. Did 3:48. Hoped for 3:30 but this course was tough! 14-19 was toughest. 2nd wind, sailed from 20 to end. great fun,” Edward wrote on Twitter just hours after the race. Even though I was back home, I was able to relive that tough course and my own second wind thanks to his updates at twitter.com/edwardnorton, where he continues to raise funds and awareness for the Maasai through giveaways and experiences that you can’t buy (a few lucky winners met Edward at his post-race party). “Sponsor Dave $34 in the next 14 hrs for a chance to win 2 Garmin watches. Pink and Blue. I’m running in my Garmin,” he wrote before the race. And everyone who visits www.maasaimarathon.com sees the link to Edward’s Garmin Connect account, where you can find his training runs with Garmin’s Forerunner 405CX and the details for his NYC Marathon. “Just posted my marathon run on Garmin Connect,” Edward wrote (yes, he does his own tweeting), “Very cool app. All details mile by mile w/moving Google Map track.” Very cool, indeed. So whether you’re a fan, a runner or someone who wants to help a great cause, check out www.maasaimarathon.com and give us a shout on Twitter at @EdwardNorton and @JakesJournal.  

Same city, same route, such a different race. Sunday I returned to the streets of Chicago, the site of my marathon debut two years ago. Back in 2007, I found the stifling heat a bit much as I backed off from my goal of 3:30 about 16 miles in. Over the final 6.2 miles that day – what most runners call “the second half” after the first 20 – I felt like I walked more than I ran. Yet I was still thrilled when I crossed the line in 3:49.28.

Two years later, I’m back in Chicago, now my fifth marathon with a PR of 3:31 on the rolling hills of Kansas City. In the weeks leading up to Chicago, I knew again that my training wasn’t ideal. A nagging knee injury kept me from going farther than 14 miles without walking, and even with breaks I never topped 18. But two things were in my favor that weren’t in 2007. The weather was 40 degrees cooler, and I was a smarter runner. Granted, I can’t take credit for either of these things. The first was out of my control, and the second is thanks to my running partner Josh and my Forerunner 310XT. Josh built up my miles, Forerunner tracked them and gave me real-time feedback on lap pace, average pace and distance covered. But without Josh beside me, I was counting on Forerunner.

The first few miles are more about holding back and not getting caught up in the rush – especially when my college buddy Chris, with Boston qualifying in mind, took off through the crowd to join the 3:10 pace group. I, on the other hand, settled into a nice 8-minute-mile clip and made friends with the 3:30 pace group. The contrast to 2007 was obvious from the start, as the starting gun followed a clothes explosion of several layers that had protected us from freezing temperatures and would later be donated to homeless shelters. Two years ago, most people showed up to the staging area in singlets and shorts.

The 10K mark was affirmation that I was running a “smart” race, nice and steady, with the first 6.2 miles officially at a 7:56 pace to put me on target for 3:27:59. The following 7 miles were more of the same – aside from a quick pit stop that necessitated a 7-minute mile to catch up – and I crossed the halfway point at 1:44:55, an 8-minute pace that forecast out at a 3:29:44 finish.

The problem with those predicted finish times is that they don’t factor in one small part of the second half of the race: Getting tired. Thanks to my abbreviated training, anything beyond the 14-mile mark was uncharted territory this fall. But a new friend motivated me to keep pushing. Running his second marathon, this high school teacher is starting a cross-country program at a Chicago suburb. At the 18-mile mark, I could tell I was holding him back, and I wasn’t ready to scrap the 8-minute miles that Forerunner was showing me. So I wished him well and soon hit the 30K mark (just shy of 19 miles) at 7:56 average, on pace for 3:27.59. More proof that I run faster when I’m gabbing.

After my new friend disappeared, the mind games began. If I can make it to 20, I’ll walk a bit. But then I hit 20 and remembered that in KC, I didn’t walk until 21. So I made it to 22 before walking through a water station, but then I saw my lap pace climbing quickly with every slower footstep. So I picked it up, slowed it down, picked it up until I was still on pace to hit 3:30 when I rounded the second-to-last corner – the one where, two years ago, I was told by police to stop running as the clocks were being turned off. This time, the cops and crowd were cheering me on by name (yes, I made a second race bib just for my name), but the final two-tenths of a mile start with the steepest climb of the entire race. It’s a cruel little trick on an otherwise flat course, but that final test to see if you’re going to hit the time that seemed attainable just moments earlier.

On the final turn, the finish-line clock was ticking mercilessly until I stomped on the mat, raised my arms for the photographers and hit stop on my Forerunner 310XT. The official text update confirmed a PR of 3:30:21. Two years after setting out to run a 3:30 in Chicago, I had achieved my original goal and I had Garmin Connect data to prove it. Sure it was just a minute faster than my previous best last fall and still 20 minutes slower than Chris and his stellar 3:09, but Boston could wait. For three and a half hours, my fussy knee was an afterthought (until later in the evening when I could barely walk), and I had run the race the way that I wanted to run. There will be time for new goals, first of which is letting my knee get back to normal, and eventually another marathon.