Everyone loves a challenge, including our friends at Garmin, who have tasked us
with seeing how many Garmin Connect badges we can get in a week.
That's right.
But first of all, what we're gonna do is we're going to set up new accounts so we can start from a clean slate.
Yeah, And it's not just about speed, either.
Manni, you might be faster than me, but I've got a few tricks up my sleeve to level the playing field.
Yeah?
What?
What tricks?
What you gonna do?
Hey, I'm not revealing any of my secrets.
And in fact, I better be off.
What do you mean, what?
We haven't talked about the rules.
Well, I'm starting the challenge straight away.
No, no, no, wait. As many badges as you can get. See you later.
Hold on. Bye!
Okay.
Garmin Badge Challenge day number one.
I'm all set up.
I've got my new Garmin Connect account, and in the process of making my account, I've already
got my first badge.
So exciting.
So I got the photogenic badge, which is adding a profile photo.
I just chose one of the stock Garmin photos, which is actually quite nice.
It's like a nice little three wheel of swimming, running and cycling.
Which brings me onto my tactics for the first few days.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna sound out tactics.
I don't want to lock them in for the entire week.
And that is: multi sports.
So I had to look at all the badges on our little
document and the, the badge I'm gonna get this morning, I'm literally gonna run and get some milk.
So, this One Mile badge, such a little cool thing,
because someone who doesn't run, they can get involved.
So the best thing about getting some early morning runs in:
you can get the supplies for breakfast.
Okay, run two, day one, a little five k.
It is currently 6:45 AM and I am starting day number two of
the Garmin Badge challenge with a walk, because my tactic is
still do more activities than Manni.
And then hopefully that will get me more badges.
10K on the treadmill before
work, enjoying it so far.
And I'm picking up the pace slowly.
I had two options to get home from a shoot.
I'm currently at a park in London.
I've just wrapped doing a bit of filming.
Um, I could have got the tube home, which is 54 minutes, or I can cycle home, which is 45.
Although this is an embarrassing thing to admit I'm always slower than the Google prediction of how long
it says it should take you to cycle.
Okay, so here we are.
Same place this morning.
Um, and I'm now doing my 5K.
Nice and easy.
As far as I can.
Make sure I save my legs.
And, uh, you don't want to do this too fast because you cause injury.
So it's nice to relax.
Cycle done. As predicted,
it took me longer that it said it would.
5K on the treadmill badge, in the bag.
I'm just waiting for Garmin to connect and load up.
So yeah, doing well?
I'm excited to see what, how I do.
How many badges I get by the end of the week?
Because right now we're cooking.
We're cooking on gas.
It's day number three, and I am dressed up, ready to go
for a run.
Um, I've just missed the badge of doing it
before seven a.m. which was the initial plan, but
I'm quite tired.
So I mean, it's only like, four minutes past seven. I have,
however, just been having a little check through Garmin Connect.
And also, I noticed a little notification pop up.
That Manni Ovola wants to be a connection.
Do I accept?
Do I take a sneak peek at how he's getting on?
So if I do one HIIT session, I get a badge, I get a HIIT badge.
So what we're gonna do, we're gonna do the HIIT session, and I think also tactically, I'm gonna
do the yoga. If I do three yoga, um,
workouts in the weekend, on the weekend,
I also get the yoga badge.
So we're going to be clever here.
We're not going to just work hard.
We're gonna work smart.
So, HIIT session.
We're gonna do one HIIT session now, the HIIT session is going to be really simple.
I'm gonna do some mountain climbers, some jumping jacks, and then I'm gonna do
some core, um, and some thrusters, and we'll do three rounds of those four
exercises.
I should be able to give you a little snippet of what that looks like.
5K done.
22:37.
Happy with that.
Definitely started off on tired legs.
So anything below that was going to be a struggle.
I don't think Sarah is up for this.
Sarah.
Just give up now.
I mean, I'm taking a rest day tomorrow.
That's how confident I am.
My plan for today is basically just to record one big long activity, and hopefully
that will get me a few other badges.
But I've woken up a little bit earlier than I needed to.
Um, I gave myself a lion.
I don't know whether sleep badges exist, but that's what I was going for.
And now I've got about half an hour until I need to leave to
go out.
So I'm going to do a bit of recovery, a bit of yoga.
I've got a lot of running to do today, so there's no point doing another run.
That would be stupid, although tempting.
Um, so, yeah, I'm gonna do a bit of yoga, I think.
I'm having a rest day.
So we're going to find out if this works for me or not.
Tomorrow I'm gonna do...
There's a badge for running late at night.
So I'm going to do that.
Um, and then I'm going to have a look at what the other badges are.
I think there's a half marathon badge, so I'm gonna do a long run on Sunday and do the half marathon badge.
Um, but yeah, I'm taking it easy.
I'm having a day off today. So I have just finished filming.
Here is they're packing up.
Say hello, Andy.
There he is.
Um, I have used the entirety of today to get myself some more badges.
I haven't been able to sync my watch yet.
But let me
run you through what I've been doing.
Number one.
I did a big, long walk, which I recorded an activity. Number two.
We filmed running B roll for about two hours, which I also filmed as a running
activity.
My average pace may have been about 19 minutes, but I think that's fine.
And then number three, we just did some drills, which was a little bit hard.
In order to clarify what workout that was on my watch, I went for strength training.
I don't know whether that technically counts, but I'm sure there's gonna be some kind of strength workout badge.
So I'm gonna go home, sync my watch with my phone when I get back.
I know I can do it out here, but the signals a little bit rubbish.
And I want to get warm because it's very cold, but there is no way that Manni will be
able to beat that.
So we are just over halfway into the Garmin Badge Challenge week and I'm on my
way to go and meet Manni to see how he's getting on, whether he's been cheating
and what his tactics are.
Let's go find him.
Hello.
All right.
You good?
I'm good.
How are you doing?
I'm really good.
I'm in the Garmin Connect Challenge.
It's good.
I'm so keen that I've actually got all of my badges up.
Ready to show you like a school report, just like I did.
Really? Well, no, I'm not proud of my God.
You shouldn't be because I'm not winning, which is really annoying. Champ right now.
Okay.
Go on then what's your favourite badge that you've got so far?
So early riser badge, definitely knew I was going to get that one.
Photogenic badge.
So adding a photo of yourself, adding, you're not photogenic, but you added one.
Okay, well... I mean I can't talk-
My mother says so. Okay, So the one I'm enjoying is the stepping up
badges, of which there are a lot.
So, so far, I've only got 15K one, which is 15,000 steps in a
day.
What, I didn't know about these ones?
Yeah, they're really good.
And on that note, I'm going for another one.
Can I see, can I see...
Sitting down isn't really gonna help.
Sarah, let me see some of those badges.
What are you doing?
What are you going? Where you going? What challenge?
Sarah, I better go because she's gone.
I better go.
Give warning.
It is day number five of the Badges Challenge.
I'm very happy with my total so far.
And today I am off to try and get some more badges starting off at parkrun.
Come on, Monty.
If we ever get there.
Okay, gang.
Today is actually Sunday.
I missed two days.
Um, so I didn't get any badges for two days.
I took one rest day and yesterday I ran like 8 to
10k.
I think I really did well in the first few days.
Um, today, today, my plan is
I am actually going to go for a long run.
So I'm gonna go for 13 miles.
There's a 13 mile badge, and then after 10 PM,
there's, like, a late night badge.
So I'm going to try and get that little badge.
So 10, 10:30, I'll go for, like, a 30 minute recovery run.
So I think that will be it.
That is a wrap.
Once I've done that. It is day number six.
There is not long left of this challenge.
Now it's time to get serious.
I am about to go out on a run, which will hopefully get
me four badges. Sunday long run out with the team.
Mo, hey. Tom.
So I got to get this Garmin badge, so I thought I'd get some help.
The boy's gonna help me.
We're gonna do 13.1, half marathon.
Well, I'm going to do that.
Mo, you gotta go, right.
I'm doing it as well. You're doing it! Mo said he had to go, but not no more, Mo is down.
So we're in Hyde Park.
I better start this watch.
Okay?
We're in Hyde Park, watch is started.
I am 10K in, feeling good, feeling happy in the
knowledge the further I go more badges I get. Here
we are, Hyde Park, getting the 13 mile badge.
We're gonna go on the sand.
8 miles in.
Here we go.
Just coming up to a half marathon, which means another badge in the bag.
Come on.
Also, I think I was on 10 thousand steps when I started, which
means not only will I be surpassing 25, I might surpass 30.
And if I play my cards right, I could go to 35.
I'm a machine.
And I'm done.
13.1 miles.
Half marathon finished.
Don't run with friends that decide to do the last mile faster than any other mile.
I'm absolutely dying, Tom is behind the camera,
and he absolutely blitzed me.
So you know how we do.
We've got to get it out there. Running Channel.
This is how- what we're about.
Getting the runs in, giving you the best content you ever did see.
25.26 kilometres, took me two hours and 24 minutes.
Which I was- ohhh!
Screenshotting that. Connect just came up saying you are beating Manni Ovola. Am I though?
Yo, so this morning, I did the half marathon.
Sarah was ahead of me before I did the half marathon.
Then I synced my watch.
You never guess what, I was ahead of Sarah.
I think.
I forgot I said I'd go for a walk at 10pm.
Oh,
it's gonna be a one minute walk.
But it's going to be a walk.
Come on.
It doesn't need to be a walk outside, though, does it?
Does it?
Oh, I'm pressing the wrong button.
I don't think it needs to be a walk outside.
I'm sure this is going to create a very heated debate in the comments, but
yeah, I'm at my front door.
I've started my
watch.
22 second walk.
Saved.
So Manni?
That is it.
The Garmin Badge challenge week ends here.
How did you get on?
Well, I got 32 badges.
Oh, very good.
I'm really proud.
Really happy.
Want to know how many I got? What did you get?
I got thirty...
Yeah.
... four badges.
No, no, no, no, no, no.
We need a judge.
You don't need a judge.
You just count.
And I have got someone to verify because I am rubbish at numbers. But how did you get on? What was
your favourite badge that you got?
Okay, So obviously, double days was a good badge.
But then when I met you, you talked about I own the night badge.
I am the night, I am the night badge, between 10 til 4.
I did a little five k little jog, little trot.
Did you get that badge?
I did get that badge. Oh yeah?
Want to know how? I did a little 22 second walk in my flat. Go on.
What?
There you go.
Listen, you can walk.
You can run.
You can do anything in this badge challenge to get yourself moving, so give it a
try at home.
Yeah, definitely.
Are there any badges that we've done this week that you've got your eye on?
Or Are there any badges that we got that you've already got as well?
It's been amazing.
Leave some comments and let us know how you're doing with the badge challenge.
And we'll see you next time on The Running Channel. Bye! Peace.