My RUNN used to be within about 0.5kph of my treadmill when I first got it, according to Zwift. Now it’s 1.1-1.3kph faster than the treadmill (12kph treadmill set and Zwift over 13kph through the RUNN). It feels about right, like it feels faster than 12kph, but how can I check accuracy (as in is the RUNN correct?). I have factory reset the RUNN and updated the firmware and the result is the same.
If I was to calibrate the RUNN via the Zwift calibration page in Zwift, is that calibrating the RUNN to Zwift (so should be then spot on), or would it be calibrating the RUNN to the treadmill? (Which I don’t want).
I’ll be interested how you get on with this, I’m very similar. After the sensor saying it’s happy with my calibration it then tells me I’m running about 0.5-07kph faster than the treadmill.
I want to believe it’s because I’ve really been running faster than I thought all this time and I suppose it’s a possibility as my best times outdoors are as good as my treadmill running. But I just assumed the tech wasn’t that good…
It’s probably the treadmill drifting. They are notably a) imprecise and b) unreliable in measuring speed. I’d trust a Runn 10 times before a treadmill. It’s a simple device - measures the delay between two marks with a known spacing.
If you want to make 100% sure, place a mark on the belt, measure the belt length (total length, top and bottom), run at a set speed, and have someone count the passages of the mark over a set time. You can calculate the belt speed from that. Don’t do it without someone running on the treadmill, high probability the speed will be far off without a load.
Correction: this is actually wrong. It measures the delay between the two built-in optical sensors for each mark. You could put a single mark and it would still work; and the spacing between the marks is irrelevant (except they recommend no closer than 18 inches).
By default it’s calibrated to 5mph so if you do a reset of the device and set your treadmill to 5mph it’ll give you some indication of how close it is.
However…dependent on the quality and power of your treadmill it could slow significantly under load. For example under load that 5mph on the treadmill could be reported as 4.5mph on the Runn and therefore Zwift.
You may also find that a calibrated Runn at 5mph reports different speeds to the treadmill as the speed increases.
This is why it is best to calibrate the Runn in game with the middle speed at the normal pace you would run constantly at. So I calibrate mine at 8mph which is my steady pace.
This assumes the treadmill is right and the Runn is off. Considering a) how the Runn measures speed vs b) how the average treadmill does, I’d venture this assumption is wrong.
I’m inclined to agree with the comments regarding the likelihood that a factory reset RUNN is more likely to be accurate compared to the actual treadmill, especially given that 12kph on the treadmill, as showing 13kph in Zwift via RUNN feels a lot more like 13kph outside.
I had a play with the Zwift calibration last night and realised it doesn’t do what I assumed (I assumed it would ignore the treadmill and calibrate RUNN to Zwift), it looks like what it will do though is calibrate Zwift to the TREADMILL speed via the input from the RUNN, which I do not want as that assumes the treadmill is correct (which it definitely is not).
What I was hoping it would do, which seems like it could easily be implemented? Is when you do the Zwift calibration, it should give you a real-time zwift speed on screen during calibration, so when it says run at 12.5kph for 40 seconds and you set your treadmill to 12.5kph zwift should be able to calculate, given the input from the RUNN, how “far” a zwifter should have ran in 40 seconds, then it can calibrate the RUNN to Zwift (and not to the treadmill), if that makes any sense at all?
Though I am yet to convince myself that’s even possible, as in theory I keep thinking you could self calibrate based on a pace bot, so if Zwift pace bot 11.9kph is on screen and you need to set your treadmill to 10.3kph to match the screen pace bot of 11.9 then you know that treadmill 10.3= zwift 11.9, but even then I’m not sure that’s a correct way of judging it as, lets say you have a faulty RUNN than reports speed 2x as fast as true, so if your belt is going 6ph and RUNN is sending 12kph to Zwift, you’d match the pace bot and therefore assume your running at 11.9/23 kph but your actually running 6kph.
Its doing my head in, If it was only 0.3-0.5kph different I’d be happy enough, but at over 1kph difference at 12kph I feel I really want to satisfy myself the RUNN is closer to real life than the TM.
Like Rober_C says, probably just have to do a belt measure & count to satisfy myself that the RUNN hasn’t gone skewy.
There is nothing to calibrate - Zwift receives speed through its connection with the Runn. It takes that number as-is, same as with, say, cadence from a sensor.
Just putting it out there… for some reason my Zwift speed is different by up to . 5 mph from my runn speed. I check this by selecting a flat route, run treadmill without being on it and looking at the Zwift speed. Then I turn on configerz, speed calibration to compare…
I wonder if Zwift does some sort of calculation using the runn speed as a basis.??. Maybe incline, wind, weight, height?? Dunno.
We’re unable to calibrate the Runn… The Mrs got on the treadmill at 3MPH so the belt was under load, I counted belt passes for 5 minutes and the indicated treadmill speed is within 1% (9’4" belt, 3MPH, 144 passes in 300 seconds), so I’m good saying the treadmill is not at fault. Next I had her hold a steady 6MPH on the treadmill while trying to calibrate the device in Zwift which is showing 10.4 MPH. The calibration fails as it times out at 10 seconds into the calibration indicating “waiting for 6MPH”. I’ll be looking next for info on firmware update on Runn, then factory default on Runn, then tech support on Runn and Zwift.
Try adjusting the position within the cradle. It could be at the higher pace it’s just not picking up the speed. It can be hyper sensitive about the position.
Also reset the device as it can have a tendency to not react properly until you reset it.
The firmware should be updated via Configurez app which is where you can reset and also calibrate it too.
However calibrating it on Zwift would appear to be more beneficial for you.
Thx Stuart. I actually went ahead w/ downloading configurez, it automatically did a firmware upgrade on the Runn and walked me through calibration, easy as could be. It was defaulted to a -6% incline which the calibration fixed. I think it is a major oversight in the easy start manual not to suggest those steps.
They say it doesn’t need calibrating but my experience tells me otherwise. Certainly the incline out of the box will always be inaccurate as that relies on your treadmill being dead level and the surface you mount the cradle on.
Has the accuracy improved in Zwift or is it now allowing you to calibrate it in game?
The accuracy in game was within 0.2 mph after calibrating incline and speed w/ configurez. I overlooked doing the further ingame calibration, I’ll do that next, but I can accept a few tenths…
Just purchased a RUNN and the time difference in minutes per mile was upwards of 30-40 seconds at some speeds. I got to thinking but what if the RUNN isn’t accurate how can I can confirm that it is. Finally it came to me. I took a wheel of my road bike that has a speed sensor and put it on my treadmill. It matched the RUNN exactly!! Now my treadmill speed workouts are really going to be a suffer fest. LOL
Personally i would manually measure the belt speed of your treadmill. 30-40 seconds over a mile is potentially close to being 1mph difference between belt speed and reported speed.
That’s some difference.
Yeah my belt is about .65 mph slower than the set speed. I did the whole manual measure routine first, counting how many times the marker goes around in 60 seconds, multiply that by the belt length, etc. It definitely proved my belt was slow but I didn’t feel it was accurate enough to prove whether the RUNN was correct or not.
Ok, and then when you add the further slowing of the belt when it’s under load (i.e. When you’re running on it) that’ll be up to another .5mph.
I don’t know the model of your treadmill but i suspect the motor will be a lower horse power model. This leads to what i call bouncing where the reported speed constantly flicks up and down.
You can help the situation a little by lubrication but i think you’re past the point of no return.
If you are technically minded there may be a component on the main power board under the hood that regulates power to the motor.
You may be able to adjust this to give the motor more power at the displayed speed.
I used to do this on my previous treadmills so i knew belt speed matched the displayed speed.
Luckily my current treadmill has remained on speed and also can be adjusted accordingly using the in built software.
If a new treadmill is in your thoughts let me know as i am an ambassador for NoblePro in the UK and can offer a discount for you.