My Three Favorite Garmin Features to Use on Race Day.
Last weekend, I ran a 10K using the Garmin Forerunner 970 and Forerunner 165 Music , and while I’ll be doing a full comparison soon, the experience immediately demonstrated one thing: sometimes it pays to have a premium running watch. While both models offer excellent running features, the 970 has a few that the 165 lacks—and after testing them on race day, I can say two of them really made a difference.
Improve your “race pace” with Garmin’s PacePro feature.
Until this weekend, I’d never tested Garmin’s PacePro feature in a real-world race. The key benefit of this feature is that it analyzes the elevation profile of your course and generates “dynamic pace recommendations” based on both the terrain and your personal preferences. Before the race, you set a target time or pace in Garmin Connect, then tell the watch how you want to tackle the climbs—you have options: push hard on the climbs, use the descents for recovery, or aim for a negative split in the second half. On race day, the watch displays your target pace for the current segment and how you’re performing against it in real time.
I love PacePro because it eliminates the need to constantly calculate your pace in your head during a run. Instead of constantly calculating your pace in your head, you can glance at your wrist and instantly know whether you’re ahead, behind, or right on track. It’s like running alongside a coach who already knows the course.
To set up PacePro, go to Garmin Connect > Training & Planning > PacePro , select or create your route, enter your goal time, and sync it to your watch before race day. The Forerunner 165 Music also supports PacePro, so this feature isn’t exclusive to the 970, but it’s still underrated and worth mentioning.
Ensure accuracy with the suggested finish line reminder.
This feature, found on the 970 but missing from the 165 Music, is a favorite of many Garmin runners—and for good reason: crossing the finish line, you’re more focused on grabbing a banana than hitting the stop button on your watch. When, 20 minutes later, you realize your watch is still recording, you’ve ruined your stats. Congratulations, your 10K now shows 10.8 miles, and your pace is completely ruined.
If you have a route loaded on your compatible Garmin watch, it can detect when you’ve crossed the finish line and prompt you to trim your data to that point, even if you forgot to press the stop button. It’s one of those features that seems insignificant until you need it, but then becomes a lifesaver for your data after the race.
Fortunately, this feature works automatically once a course becomes active. To ensure it’s working, you need to go to the Garmin Connect app , select “Races & Events,” and double-check that your race is downloaded to your watch and ready to run before race day.
Ease your mind with the Automatic Timing Gate Lap feature.
This is the feature I’m most excited to talk about, and like all the others, it’s exclusive to the Forerunner 970 (the 165 doesn’t have it). Here’s the problem it solves: in any big-city race, you’re constantly weaving through crowds, taking shortcuts, and generally accumulating a bit of extra distance, which the GPS faithfully records. By the third or fourth mile, your watch’s readings probably won’t line up perfectly with the mile markers on the course. You might think you’re running at 9:00 pace, but the mile markers tell you otherwise, and now you have to do some mental gymnastics mid-race to figure out what’s real.
The “Automatic Lap Counting at Checkpoints” feature solves this problem by triggering lap counting based on actual mile or kilometer markers, rather than GPS data. This way, when you reach the first mile on the track, your watch will register a lap, regardless of how much the GPS signal has changed. Your split times reflect the race as it was actually measured, not the slightly distorted version recorded by your GPS.
To enable this feature, go to the Garmin Connect app and find your specific race in the “Races & Events” menu. You can either select an existing race by searching for its name or location, or create a custom event. Enable the “Timing Gates” option, then select whether you want to use miles or kilometers. On race day, you’ll start the official race as an activity on your watch, and your watch will automatically start laps when you pass a pre-determined official course marker, as well as display the actual distance you’ve traveled. There weren’t many entrants at last year’s race, so I’m looking forward to testing this feature at the popular Brooklyn Half Marathon next weekend.