Congratulations to our challenge winners for the month of July!

• Most Miles: Once again, lasabur takes top honors with 250.08 miles. Go lasabur!
• Fastest 1 Mile: mdoug earns fastest mile honors with a time of 4′47”
• Fastest 3K: mdoug again, with a time of 9′42”
• Fastest 5K: mdoug takes the prize with a time of 16′30”
• Fastest 10K: mdoug sweeps the July “Fastest” challenges with a time of 35′23”

Congrats to both of July’s winners, and best of luck to August’s challengers. If you’re not already running with us this month, head over to the Challenges page, join in, and get running!

Is your Nike+ Sport Kit battery kaput?  Don’t want to spend the $20 necessary on a new sensor?  Why not check out this handy, do-it-yourself article, “Replace battery in Nike+ receiver for under $5.”

The steps should take 10-15 minutes to complete and require tools that you probably already have around the house.  You’ll need to buy a new battery, of course, but the required CR2032 battery is easily found at many online retailers and at your local RadioShack.

Via Instructables.

Last month my wife brought home a Garmin Forerunner 305 that her company wanted her to test out.  She didn’t have the time or the energy to test it herself, so she asked me if I would be their guinea pig.  I couldn’t jump in that mouse maze fast enough!  It was the perfect opportunity to perform a head-to-head comparison of the Garmin Forerunner 305 vs the Nike+ Sport Kit.

The calibration for the Garmin took about two minutes.  You have to be outside when you turn the Forerunner on so it can sync with the GPS satellites.  After I zeroed everything out and strapped on the heart monitor, I was off to the races.

The course that I ran was relatively straight and covered a distance of 1.2 miles.  When I finished the Garmin had recorded a distance of 1.27 miles and the Nike+ chip had recorded a distance of 1.19 files.

So, at the end of the run, which one was better?

Unfortunately there isn’t a definitive answer, not from this weekend warrior.  Personally, I prefer the Nike+ chip because:

• It has an easy setup
• The music
• Better online community
• Less hardware to manage
• Much cheaper

However, the Garmin Forerunner 305 does have:

• Heart rate monitor
• GPS mapping
• Lap history
• Slightly more accurate distance

I would recommend the Garmin Forerunner for the serious, hardcore athlete who models their training after a chapter in Lance Armstrong’s book.  For the everyday runner, I can’t endorse the Nike+ Sport Kit enough.  For the price, I don’t think you can beat the Nike+ experience.

Congratulations to our challenge winners for the month of May!

• Most Miles: lasabur took simonji’s place at the top with 293.37 miles!
• Fastest 1 Mile: robottino keeps fastest mile honors with a time of 5′26”
• Fastest 3K: robottino again, with a time of 11′39”
• Fastest 5K: Jay35 takes the honors with a time of 19′17”
• Fastest 10K: Newcomer keithmichael blazes to the top with a time of 35′49”

Congrats to June’s winners, and best of luck to July’s challengers. If you’re not already running with us this month, head over to the Challenges page, join in, and get running!

The Detroit Free Press reported results on Tuesday of the 2008 Consumer Reports running shoe survey. Top of the list? The Nike Air Zoom Vomero+ series available for both men and women.

The survey, which involved testers running a total of 1,240 miles on 205 pairs of running shoes, rated shoes based on stability, cushioning, fit, weight, breathability and flexibility. Here are the official top three winners:

1. Nike Air Zoom Vomero+
2. Brooks Glycerin 6
3. Adidas Supernova Cushion 7

Forbes reports that 24 Hour Fitness will soon begin outfitting selected gyms with Nike+ iPod enabled equipment.

“24 Hour Fitness, the largest fitness club chain in the U.S., is the first to offer new Nike + iPod enabled gym equipment in select clubs across the country. Nike and Apple worked with major gym equipment manufacturers to make their cardio equipment Nike + iPod compatible so gym members can easily track and record workouts on cardio equipment like treadmills, stair steppers, elliptical trainers and stationary bikes.”

We wrote about the Nike+ Gym tie-in back in March, along with Endgadget, Gizmodo, and others.  It’s nice to see some promised new features coming to pass.  Now let’s see about that Nike+ iPhone integration . . .

Brian Morrissey of The Internal Pigdog politely expressed some frustrations with the accuracy of his Nike+ SportBand over the course of a few posts in mid May.

On May 18:

“So far, I’m underwhelmed. The chart above shows my run today. After nine years of running, I figure I have a pretty good sense of pace. There’s no way it was that slow. I ran today more at 7:30 or a little below. The graph also has all these peaks and troughs that don’t make sense.”

Again, on May 19:

“To test the accuracy, I ran to the park, then started Nike+. I did the four-mile loop (technically, a USATF-measured 4.04). Nike+ told me 3.71 miles. I was pretty much exactly right about the distance. My internal odometer kicked Nike+’s ass.”

Nike responded directly to Brian’s concerns in the person of Blogger user PLe1, the director of Nike’s RUN NYC program.

“Brian, just for the sake of disclosure I’m the director of Nike’s RUN NYC program. I just want that out there so it’s not like I’m hidng the fact I work for Nike.
Out of the box it’s 90% accurate and set for 8 minute pace but it’s designed so that every runner can make it work for their particular cadence by calibrating it.”

Make sure to check out Brian’s article and the article’s comments thread for the whole story.

What if all Nike+ runners could run in the same race, on the same day, no matter where they are in the world? The flexibility of Nike+ gives runners of all abilities the opportunity to do this. The race, to be known as The Human Race, will be taking place on August 31, 2008.

The 10km (6.21 miles) event will unite over a million Nike+ runners from all around the world in not just a battle of fitness, speed and stamina, but also a battle to raise money for three well known charities - The UN Refugee Charity, The Lance Armstrong Foundation, and the World Wildlife Fund. Each participating Nike+ runner can choose a charity to represent while they run, and every step in the race will earn money towards their selected charity. Starting in July, the Nike+ Web site will also allow runners to accept and manage personal donations from friends, family and colleagues.

400mToGo.com will be participating in this historic event, will you? More info and sign-up here.

Man, it’s been so long since I’ve had time to sit down and write I almost forgot my login. Nonetheless, I was able to navigate the archives in my head to bring you what I humbly believe is one of the greatest features of the Nike+ site. No, it’s not the new online training program (the one that will set a custom training program up for you), nor is it any of the various widgets that are available for download (desktop and screensaver flavors). It’s the “My Nike+ Mini“, truly the greatest thing since sliced bread.

To begin the creation of your little sidekick, click on the “My Nike+ Mini: Create Your Own” image, in the lower right-hand corner of the Nike+ website, beneath the “Last Run” dashboard (If you can’t find the link, try looking under the “Runs” menu). From there, the creation wizard makes it easy to customize the look of your Nike+ Mini. You’re able to customize from a stock selection of hair, eyes, mouth, nose, shoes, clothing and even facial hair.

After you’ve created your “Mini Me”, you have the option to download it as a screensaver or to add it as a widget to your Facebook account. All the more reason to pick up an iPod nano and a Nike+ Sport Kit. Who needs challenges when you can create a flash version of yourself? Note: likeness will vary.

I hope this is just a sample of many new features to come from the Nike+ website.

Congratulations to our challenge winners for the month of May!

• simonji ran the Most Miles with 236.1 miles under his belt
• robottino ran the Fastest 1 Mile with a time of 5′23”
• Robi. LM picked up Fasted 3K honors with a time of 11′56”
• SundanceKid ran May’s Fastest 5K with a time of 20′16”
• lasabur is our Fastest 10K winner with a time of 44′09”

Keep up the great work, folks. Jump over to our Challenges page to get into the action for the month of June. May the best runners win!