lgusto

I'll start by saying I hesitated on buying a Catalyst for months but finally did so after reading so many kudos from the folks at SpeedSecrets. IMHO, the device is invaluable.

I'm a computer guy by profession so anything related to technology causes me to initially ask two questions. First, if the device gets broken, lost or stolen will I have a backup or will I have to start again from scratch. Second, how can I make use of ALL the data the device is capable of producing.

Addressing the question of backups first, I started with Garmin technical support. They told me "NO", if the Catalyst is broken, lost or stolen you will have to start again from scratch except for videos that you had previously exported to a computer. Garmin said there is no way to backup and then restore all of your session data to another Catalyst. I don't believe this but would love to have someone verify my approach since i don't have a second Catalyst for testing. Using a Windows 10 PC it seems that one can copy everything that shows up on the PC's File Explorer and save all of those files for use if a new Catalyst is needed.

That content includes:

1. "This PC\Catalyst\Internal storage" - I believe this is all of the Catalyst's operating system, personal settings and session data.
2. "This PC\Catalyst\Transcend SD card" - This is the micro USB card that came with the Catalyst installed in the bottom slot. This seems to be where saved videos are stored. It is a 32gb card which the Catayst says will hold about 6 hours of data based on the information bar on the main screen.
3. "This PC\Catalyst\Samsung SD card" - This is a micro USB card that I purchased separately and installs in the side slot. This seems to be where saved videos are now stored. It is a 256gb card and now the Catayst says it will hold about 60 hours of data based on the information bar on the main screen.

My theory is that by backing up the Internal Storage folder I can copy it to a new Catalyst if needed and retain all of my old data and sessions. I would LOVE to have someone test this theory in practice if they have multiple Catalysts (perhaps the SpeedSecrets guys or your friends in Garmin Tech???).

DISCLAIMER! Non-tech guys will find this next section exceedingly boring.........

Second, trying to make use of ALL the data the device is capable of producing. Some research showed that the Catalyst uses Garmin's FIT data format (also used in bike computers and other devices). There is a really useful FIT SDK published by Garmin that comes along with a CSV export tool (https://developer.garmin.com/fit/overview/). The CSV tool is written in JAVA and seems both straight forward and capable of much more. I used the tool to create a CSV file of my own sessions and there's a wealth of GPS and Telemetry data available. My ultimate goal is to use the Catalyst data to produce my own graphs along with vMin and vMax at each corner (Sebring is my most frequent track although others include Watkins Glen and a few around the North East including Club Motorsports...a real gem). As with my first topic on backups, I would LOVE to have others join me in a project to produce detailed graphs (perhaps the SpeedSecrets guys or your friends in Garmin Tech???).

Cheers.

lgusto

PS..I'm a stickler for backups based on lots of experience. I even copied and pasted the above post before hitting "submit". Lo and behold, the post didn't submit properly and I had to login again. My Word backup saved me from having to type everything all over.

ProCoach

Your idea to make track reports (vMin and vMax, or speed "latching") as a visual and statistical aid to identify improvement and opportunities for improvement is a very good one.

Garmin is like most multi-nationals, in that they're committed to supplying the hardware and software as-is, then integrating the most popular suggestions over time.

Prime example is the Catalyst mobile app. Have you tried that?

One of the best .csv viewers for this purpose is MegaLog. Also, I'd reach out to Gama and the team at TrackAttack.io

Track Attack has been the most successful in integrating on the same page and software package a variety of proprietary log files from Traqmate, MoTeC, AiM, VBOX and more.

Will certainly talk to Ross at Speed Secrets when he returns from the WEC race about this. Thanks for posting and interested in your progress.

Matt Romanowski

AFAIK, Gama hasn't been involved in TrackAttack for a number of years. It was sold to a kart company in 2019 IIRC.

Megalog is the best bet if you want advanced graphing from a CSV. It's pretty powerful.

Matt Romanowski

If your going to the length of doing all that and then taking the data to look at the GPS data (speed, g forces, etc), why not just get an AiM Solo 2 and have all of that and the analysis package? AiM has an sdk for analysis https://www.aim-sportline.com/downlo...ftware_101.pdf and you can use VS or MatLab if you really want to geek out. You can also export CSV automatically on data download and then use that in Excel or whatever else.

lgusto

Matt, thanks for the suggestion. Unless I missed something when considering the Aim product it doesn't give you the immediate video feedback to use in between sessions. I love the Ross's 5/15/1 suggestions about how to use the Catalyst between sessions to find areas of improvement. I can immediately say "ah! I turned in too soon at the hairpin..." using the video.

lgusto

Peter, thanks for the feedback. I am using the Catalyst mobile app and its graphs. With considerable effort you can mentally overlay which corner fits into the graph data but it's a chore. The graphs do give you mileage, e.g. 2.217, but it would be much better to display turn numbers.

I'll dig into MegaLog, thanks to you and Matt for suggesting. Will share any neat results.

ProCoach

Yes, the Catalyst package of integrated hardware and active, prioritized opportunities for improvement are in a class of its own. Most folks don’t have time to do everything they need to come up with even near the same action plan with conventional loggers and software. Much less in the same amount of time.

Are you using the advanced audio coach and real time audio feedback?

lgusto

Peter,

I have not used any of the audio feedback features....yet....but plan to during my next outing at Sebring this week. I believe Ross will be there as well and I'll say hello for you.

Quick update, I've spent a few hours digging into the Catalyst data using the FIT SDK and have to say I really can't improve very much over the analysis that comes on the Catalyst out of the box. Using the "Segments" review I can see all that I need to make decisions on improvement.

It would be awesome for the Catalyst to overlay data from my bluetooth OBD device when saving videos but I'm guessing that's beating a dead horse based on a lot of the comments I've read about the Catalyst.

For now I'll focus on my first objective which was finding a way to backup, and restore if ever necessary, my profile, settings and sessions data. Perhaps I'll bug Ross about that later this week .

Thank you again for your insights.

ProCoach

I agree with you. Not a lot to be gained.

sonorous

In my opinion the Catalyst is a tool with data useful for the same day you are using it. I don't see any value in preserving all of the old data. It is not needed in any way for the tool to do it's job. The app does a good job of syncing key highlights to the cloud which can be referenced long term. My workflow after a day at the track is to sync the device to the cloud and output a video file or two as a historical reference point. The rest could be lost and I would not be concerned...

Definitely try the live coaching! I think of it this way... Using a traditional data tool, you go out and drive, then review data between sessions, and develop a plan for the next session, go out and try a few things, and repeat. It is an iterative process that takes a lot of time. The real time coaching compresses that time by analyzing data and making suggestions while you drive and providing instant feedback based on your execution.

lgusto

Spoiler ALERT! Most people will find this post incredibly dull.

Not ever satisfied until I've wrung every last drop of value out of data I've spent some time over the last month working on my Catalyst data. The goal of course is to become a better, faster driver...safely.

The data that appears on the Catalyst itself and the accompanying Garmin app just didn't satisfy my curiosity. I started my quest pondering the advice I've read that the most important corner on a track is usually the fastest corner that leads to a long straight (thank you Ross Bentley). I wanted to know if it was possible for the data (at least, MY data) to back that up based on a three day event at Sebring last month.

I'll spare everyone all the gory details of my work on the FIT protocol but I am now able to retrieve and analyze all of the Catalyst data in depth, resulting in things like the vMin in every corner in every lap in every session on each day of an event. Combing that with some filters for anomalies (rain, training laps, etc.) I come up with the following table at Sebring that correlates Turn vMin to Lap Time:

Turn # Correlation
1 -40.2
3 -43.4
5 -36.6
7 -56.2
10 -49.1
13 -72.7
15 -63.8
16 -61.8
17 -80.7

For those familiar with Sebring, the answer pretty much jumps off the screen. Yes! The data supports the hypothesis. The vMin in Turn 17 (leading onto the front straight) correlates most closely to lap time, followed by Turn 13 (leading into Bishops) and then Turn 16 (leading onto the back straight).

Any thoughts, comments or suggestions from all the other data geeks out there?

lgusto

Peter,

Thanks for the feedback. The confusion stems from the formatting, which I struggle with on Rennslist. There is no vMin in my table. The columns are "Turn #" and then "Correlation" which is the Pearson R value of the relationship between the Turn's vMin and lap speed. For example, Turn 17's vMin is negatively (slower speed produces slower lap times) correlated to lap time by a factor of 80.7. In other words Turn 17's vMin and overall Lap Time are closely connected. In comparison, Turn 5's vMin is only correlated to Lap Time by a factor of 36.6. Make sense? What I'm trying to do is find the turn which deserves the most attention if trying to improve lap speeds. My data says it's Turn 17, which is (in a relative sense) more than twice as important as Turn 5.

Perhaps I'm only going down a rabbit hole.

Matt Romanowski

I had to re-read the column titles and then I saw what you were doing. Neat analysis and not something that many people have actually done. There is nothing wrong with a good rabbit hole on occasion.

ProCoach

Ah! I SEE, said the blind man! I apologize.

I deleted my posts since they weren't germane to the discussion.

Yes, I see your model.

I think the fact that you're in T5 for 4.5 seconds and in T17 for 11 seconds (time spent and distance covered above a lat g threshold) would help support your correlation, but I think there's a LOT more to prioritizing corner importance than that...