My Brilliant Illegal Invention

After the 5K this Sunday, various athletes were showing me their Garmin satellite watches, which show pace, past performance, mileage, heart rate, etc. You can set them to beep at certain points, or to compare your current race performance to a past performance so that you can set a new personal record. I got to thinking that essentially it's a pace setter, which is an illegal advantage in a professional race. You can't have a person on the sidelines who is helping you maintain a specific pace. So why should you have a watch that does it?

For years people have written split times on their arms so they can gauge their pace (e.g. 7:35/15:10/22:45 to show how long each mile should take). Now you can buy audio programs for your iPod that contain motivational speaking as well as music to train to (although these are banned in racing). Imagine if your watch not only held your pace and performance information, but it spoke to you in the voice of your coach, giving you advice designed for specific transitions in the race? With wireless bluetooth you could have an invisible ear bud.

We all eat and hydrate along the way in long-distance races. What if the watch activated transdermal caffeine exposure at certain points?

Everyone tells me how fun these watches are. You start to race yourself at the track. But you also can get dependent on them. Pretty soon you feel dejected if you don't have the heart rate monitor and the pace information right there.

You don't need any of it, of course. It's a low-tech sport. But if you want to market my idea...