Run Tracking! Watches and Dashboards! Oh My!

Tracking the distance and time of training runs is necessary for training properly for any race distance.  Reviewing runs over time is fun and motivational.  I often find myself feeling that a run I just finished was too slow.  Looking back at of a similar distance helps me to gauge whether I've actually slowed down (and often I haven't).  In order to track runs you'll need some tool to measure the time and distance of your run.  You'll also need someplace to keep a long term log of the runs.

Since August 2010, I've been through several phases of tracking runs.  I like my current set up the best but I'll explain what worked and what didn't for each of the others I've used.

I started out using Nike+ Ipod to track everything.  This was ok but calibration was never quite right.  My distances were off.  I was doing most of my running at an indoor track so I always knew the actual distance that I ran.  But the http://nikerunning.nike.com/ was pretty craptastic.  It sometimes would force me to log in three times before taking me to my dashboard.  It also wouldn't allow me to modify the stats reported by the ipod tracking.  This was a fairly cheap way to track when I was starting out and I was happy with it for a while.

In June 2011, Nike came out with the Nike+ Gps Sportwatch.  Since I was starting marathon training I thought this would be useful for running outside.  The watch linked with the Nike+ shoe pod so that when it lost GPS it would keep tracking.  When I first got it, I had some trouble.  It would lose GPS in the middle of a run and never pick it up again.  I do most of my running in the city so I understand blips of lost GPS.  But never finding it again?  Thats no good.  I was also still stuck with the http://nikerunning.nike.com/ tracking.  I love the coach plans that Nike has on their site. As far as tracking runs and showing stats, they don't do a great job.

In September 2011, the Nike+ Gps Sportwatch completely crapped out on me.  It always told me that I was running 5 minute miles.  I'm pretty sure I'm not capable of a 5 minute mile.  Support from Nike was abysmal.  Fortunately I ordered from Finishline.com.  While I was outside of their return period, they said as a one time courtesy they would exchange the watch for store credit.  At $200 the Nike+ GPS Sport watch is more expensive and less functional than many other models.  I would not recommend it to anyone.

Around the time that I returned the Nike watch, I borrowed a friend's Garmin Forerunner 305.  I used it for a few training runs as well as for the 2011 Disney Wine & Dine Half Marathon.  I was happy with the watch overall.  It was a bit slow in finding satellites in the city but in Disney World it was super quick.  I ordered my own Garmin and at the time it was only $130.  A much better deal than the Nike+ watch.  It came with a heart rate monitor and was much more fully featured.

Garmin has their own site for run tracking but I wanted to keep all of my run history in one place.   So I imported everything into dailymile.com and I've been using them since.  I'm happy that I don't have the frustration of logging into http://nikerunning.nike.com/ on a regular basis although I do still use their coach training programs.

Do you know of any devices or sites that are better than the Garmin Forerunner 305 or dailymile.com?  What sets them apart?