I wasn’t sure if this should be in FQ or IMHO. If it should be moved, that’s fine by me.
I have a new watch that tracks my workouts, including speed and top speed. Two weeks in a row, it showed a top speed of around 20 mph.
Is that even possible for someone like me, mid fifties, somewhat athletic? It would be over very short distances – my watch is tracking me playing Ultimate. A few times per session, I’ll go all out, trying to chase down a throw or while playing defense.
When watching football, they show pro receivers hitting speeds of 23 mph, which makes me skeptical that I might be topping out at 20. I’m assuming my watch can’t accurately measure speed over short distances. But, maybe I’m wrong and it’s not that uncommon for a middle-aged male to hit a speed like that, if only briefly.
I’m going to @running_coach, but I’m sure there are lots of others who may be able to set me straight.
Watches (and phones) aren’t very good at “top speed” measurements. There are too few data points for really accurate measurements over short time periods.
No, it’s safe to say there’s no way you’re running 20 mph, even for a second or two. Sorry. The watch is on your wrist. I don’t actually know what what ‘Ultimate’ is, but you mentioned “chasing down a throw” so I know it involves throwing; so my guess is that the 20mph reading is tracking your arm movement when you throw.
Another vote/data point for “no way.” My sister and I bike 20-35 miles 2-3x/week, averaging 13-15 MPH. We are in our 60s, but reasonably fit. (We use hybrid bikes, mostly on crushed limestone trails - road bikes on pavement would be faster.) She has a computer on her bike. We’ve never hit 20 MPH. No way an average middle aged male could beat our top speed.
Another note - 13 MPH is approx the speed of a worldclass marathoner. I think someone would have to be pretty exceptionally fit/fast to stick with one of those guys for even 100 yds.
I dunno - maybe downhill w/ a tailwind for brief spurts. But speed isn’t really our goal as we’re usually going 20+ miles. So we don’t really keep an eye on it. Instead, if I’m setting a quick pace, my sister might observe that we are up around 18. Or if we are dragging, she’ll note that we are below 13. When we are going 16, we are (just about) the fastest bikes out there.
Here’s another datapoint: 20 MPH = 11.2 seconds in the 100m. That is pretty darn quick even for a high school track runner. (ninja-ed)
Now, I don’t know what duration your tracker is recording as the max. I could imagine that if you quickly change direction, that might momentarily translate into some crazy fast speed. But once you take a couple of steps, no average middle ager is moving 20 MPH.
Readings are not continual, they take place at various intervals. It may be that the timing is rare but happens once every few games where it takes two reading at either end of an arm swing. Or it may have nothing to do with arm placement and can be attributed to your body’s motion.
Either way, it’s very unlikely that you were running at 20 MPH at any time. The randomness of the GPS readings from a watch account for spurrious results.
I often see skiers post their watch or phone data from a day on the slopes that show top speed in the 60 MPH range when there’s simply no chance they were traveling that fast. It’s just a limitation of those devices.
Maybe even your arm movements only reach 20 mph very infrequently. Or, more likely, the speed sensing is just off. In any case, there’s no way you’re reaching 20 mph by running, even for a second or two.
If you really are curious - have a friend/relative agree to drive past your house at 20 MPH. See if you can keep up with them even for a couple of feet.
Not really. The finals at the California State Meet this past season ranged from 10.2-10.63 (wind 2.0m/sec so just over the legal limit).
In football, top speed are lower as they don’t typically run more than a few yards. More important is how fast they accelerate. That’s why a 40 yd time is the benchmark. Usain Bolt topped out at 27 but it took him 67 meters to reach that speed.
I don’t know what watch you have or how it’s setup, but Garmin’s can be set for every second readings. It’s possible that you kept that pace for the right 1.02 seconds so that that was an accurate reading, but no, that doesn’t mean you’re not able to keep up with a college football player running the full 40m or an Usain Bolt for all of the hundred meters; if accurate, you matched them for about 10m, & then you slowed/stopped.
Eliud Kipchoge ran the fastest marathon ever at 1:59:40; however, it’s not an official record because it wasn’t a race & he had help (pacers throughout the race where each one was only running a portion but they were coming in & out, not all starting with him); that works out to 4:34.5 per mile for each of the 26 miles. The minimum qualifying time for a HS miler to make it to the state championship meet in my state is faster than that. His pace worked out to a 100m in 17s; except he kept that up for 422 100m in a row! I might even match him for the first 100yds
If your watch is tracking with an accelerometer, it wouldn’t surprise me that it would up your speed for just about any sport. Ultimate has a ton of arm movement in combination with lots of running, so it’s probably going wild. Think about how much overall motion it’s detecting when you’re making a bid for a disc while running at top speed.
But speed isn’t really our goal as we’re usually going 20+ miles. So we don’t really keep an eye on it. Instead, if I’m setting a quick pace, my sister might observe that we are up around 18. Or if we are dragging, she’ll note that we are below 13. When we are going 16, we are (just about) the fastest bikes out there.