Garmin Catalyst

To help you harness your inner speed demon, Garmin has created a driving performance analyser to stick in your car on track days

A strangely tiny racing coach

£900 / stuff.tv/catalyst

■ Motorsport is expensive, but track days where you turn up in something mechanically sound for a few laps are increasingly affordable. So this is a circuit sat-nav that draws on Garmin’s sensor, accelerometer and camera tech to create a virtual racing coach.

■ The 6.95in touchscreen tablet mounts to your windscreen and all interaction is via the large, bright and easy-to-read display – which it needs to be for cursory glances at over 100mph. A separate camera captures 1080p video and offers overlays of performance data.

■ Garmin’s 10Hz MULTI-GNSS positioning tech allows the Catalyst to build an incredibly accurate picture of your line around a circuit. This, coupled with racing-line info from circuits around the world, helps determine the most efficient (read fastest) way to get around.

■ Plopped inside a Porsche Cayman at Thruxton race circuit, we lapped until the stomach complaints started, then popped into the pits to do a bit of sick as the Garmin analysed our session, mapping an ‘optimal lap’ made up of our slickest sections.

■ Tips are presented to improve lap times by refining apex points and braking. Audible coaching is then added to the next session, and the day ends with tonnes of performance data to pore over, complete with annotated video.

Tech specs

Display 6.95in 1024x600 IPS touchscreen Battery life Up to

2hrs (12v lighter socket) Storage 16GB + microsd Connectivity Bluetooth, Wi-fi, 3.5mm audio Camera 1080p @ 30fps Dimensions 199x122x24mm, 437g

Glow, glow, glow! The Catalyst displays a ‘delta time’ based on your best selected laps; a menacing red glow means you’re losing time, while green means you’re improving. Sadly there’s no virtual racing line to follow like in Gran Turismo.

Turn, turn, turn! Having a car with a Bluetooth sound system is essential, unless you have a fancy racing helmet with a headphone jack, as voice instruction from the unit’s own little speaker gets lost amid the roaring engine and squealing tyres.