The "Pay ALL your debt off by Xmas 2012" challenge - PART 3!!!

mf0u1098

tirlittan wrote: »

Jemma,

Yes, have been thinking of buying a garmin for running and triathlon but don't really want to spend loads of money. The 'square' garmins look huge as well and I don't have big wrists. Should really go and try one somewhere. I was wondering how good the bezel would be, I think it would do my head in as well if it kept doing that.

I'm training for my first half marathon atm and getting by with my android phone app and stop watch. Sometimes the app doesn't work though and it's bit annoying. Friend bought Polar FT7 which looks quite good and isn't huge, and is also reasonably priced. If garmin I was looking at the 410, but not sure now.

Did my first sprint tri this year and looking to olympic distance and possibly half ironman next year. And like gadgets that keep track of things you do so something is in order. Was going to wait till I was debt free (should be Oct this year) but have already saved £30 by doing surveys and stuff which is towards whatever gps watch I end up buying.

So are you preparing already for you next year's challenge? 25miles per week sounds good! I'm not quite there at the moment.

I agree the best way to choose which gps watch to get is to go somewhere and try them all out. Trust me when I say I wish I'd done this! I'm going to the running club tonight so I'll take it with me and try it out and decide if I can handle using it or not. I liked the idea of having everything in one place and just being able to download all the data into a central website to monitor. It also is meant to have one of the most accurate GPS's out there which will be really important for tracking my actual mileage next year. My mum and I have different phones on different networks but were using the same app on a run. We ran side by side all the way but hers showed we'd run 0.25miles more than mine!!! When I'm looking to run 2013kms next year then I need it to be accurate!

In terms of training, I am not anywhere near the level I need to be for my challenge but I am building it up very slowly for the next 6 months so I don't get an injury. I have scheduled in a few 10k's and a half marathon before the end of this year so I can start 2013 at full speed.

Wow, olympic and half ironman standard is absolutely awesome!!! I'd love to do a triathlon but I don't like swimming! When did you start training or have you always been sporty? x

Mrs_Addicted_to_Spending

Ruthy1604 - glad you had a good weekend away and well done on payment.

Well done to all others who've made payments

Jake's Mum - sorry to hear about your finger - hope it gets better soon.

tirlittan

Oh don't get me wrong Jemma, I'm not ready for olympic or half ironman at the moment but plenty of time to train for next year! Looking at doing OD in July and half ironman in September next year so that's a year to train.

I do indoor and beach volleyball, mountain biking and running. Last year was bit of a wash out as I was ill with cold a lot and also put some extra weight on so finding running bit harder now and am a lot slower than I used to be. Started training at the end of last year again more regularly but still need to be more consistent. Good threads on runners world and triathletes world so if you ever pop in there,it's a pretty good place.

BrandNewStart

***WARNING: RANT ALERT***

Evening all

Can I just say I HATE the Student Loans Company?? :mad:

Thank you.

I got around 2hrs sleep max last night - don't know why, my mind was buzzing and racing a bit. I couldn't relax. Was fine at work but went home on the dot and shattered by the time I got home. When I did get home I found a letter from my "friends" at the Student Loans Company. I finished paying off my final loan in Feb - or so I thought. Turns out I still have a month remaining. I really find it incredible that they cannot have real time access to the loans they are giving out and have to wait til the end of the year for the Inland Revenue to send them the details. Result - burden is on customer to prove you've paid it off, or you keep on (over)paying until the year ends when they refund you! How crazy is that??:mad:

ANYWAY, I phoned them. The lad on the phone was really aggressive. I asked if it could be a mistake and he accused me of disputing the payment, which I was not doing at all. As I was trying to explain this he kept interrupting me. I asked him not to be disrespectful and let me finish. He told me to stop swearing at him - I wasn't aware I had started! I asked for his name and to speak to his manager. He said there was no manager there (a lie as it later turned out) and that it would take 72 hours for someone to get back to me - another lie. When I called back I found a nice lady who helped me sort it and told me that the previous agent had been lying to me. Looks like I did need to pay, which is fine - I had miscalculated it. I paid the last £210 and now it's sorted. Feels like it has scuppered this month really:(

Not what I needed! 1) ANOTHER chunk of money gone this month 2) Why can't people just be nice?

Sorry for the rant!

***RANT OVER***

BrandNewStart

Also can I just thank Ruthy and Babble for their kind words? i'm sorry I forgot my manners while RANTING #ironic

psychopathbabble

BrandNewStart wrote: »

Also can I just thank Ruthy and Babble for their kind words? i'm sorry I forgot my manners while RANTING #ironic

Haha it's ok... You should have heard me swearing about the banks when i was away! It's so frustrating

brightpurple

Updated figures #256
£6314.34/£15,000

SpagBol

mf0u1098 wrote: »

I bought the 410 with HRM as it was only £140 from Am@zon which was almost the same price as the 110. I think Pedro has the 110 if you want to ask what it's like? Basically I've found it really difficult to use and setting up my profile as soon as it had charged was a nightmare. Worst was the date of birth where you have to scroll through year by year to get your year of birth... To scroll you have to run your finger along the plastic outside of the watch face (on the outer edge though, not close to the actual glass part) but every time I tried to scroll it just pressed enter instead to the next data to be input so I've move back to the year again and try to scroll back again and it would jump to another menu as it didn't register the scroll... I know that the initial set up is only done once but there are loads of menus to go through depending on what you want to track on your run and I don't think I can handle the scrolling! I don't think the 110 has the bezel though. There is a 610 which is touchscreen but it's around £230!!!

I decided a few months ago that I am quite good at long term challenges like this one but am pretty pants at any short term goal such as "I want to run a half marathon" cos I do only the bare minimum and as soon as the race is done then I don't run any more (or whatever it is that I was working towards) cos I have no goal/motivation. With this in mind then I decided that to really get fit then I have to have a long term running challenge so I am going to run 2013kms in 2013... This equates to almost 25miles per week every week of 2013... :eek:

I've started to plan races for next year which includes at least 2 marathons, 3 half marathons and numerous 10k's. Luckily I've ran 10k's and half marathons before so I know what to expect but that was 5 yrs ago so I need to get my fitness level back up...

Oh my word, I've really been waffling away!!!! Sorry!

Are you thinking of buying a garmin for running or triathlon or something?

xxx

I have a garmin 305 which I used to train for a marathon, found it really good and quite easy to use although I would have liked it to update automatically rather than me have to plug it in after every run!! My friend got a bells and whistles garmin but could never work it!! :rotfl:

PedroMatias

psychopathbabble wrote: »

Pedro – how did the race go?

Race went well, thanks for asking! I beat my target time by two minutes, got 54:08 in the end. I've aggravated an existing hamstring injury though so it's been on ice today. I might have to face up to my body image issues and go swimming for a few weeks, I just hope it doesn't scupper the Great North

Tirlittan - I have the Garmin 110 which is the most basic one, but it's still a decent piece of kit, and does everything I need really. Just buttons, no bezel or touchscreen, so it's simple to use. I do fancy the 610 though, I've had a play and it's a really nice watch. They're not properly waterproof, mind, so triathlons might need one of the xt range.

SpagBol

I don't even know what a bezel is! :rotfl: