Correction. Live logging is no longer an unpaid feature of the app. The Club Account does not upgrade your RWGPS membership to a Premium membership, but only gives you some paid Premium features like voice navigation and map tile downloading for offline use on Club Routes ONLY. Live logging was originally free and since I've had a paid membership for a couple years, live logging has always been enabled when I use the app, although I've only used it a few times and never thought of sharing it live with my wife or riding friends, and not sure how well that would work for precise location. I'll be interested in your success with live logging, Jim. It was not specifically listed as one of the member benefits of the club account.

Jim Robinson's comment about live logging made me realize that some clarification between non-paid and paid members is required. Please see this RideWithGPS chart comparing the features for the different levels of membership. The Club Account gives you some, but not all, Premium features for the app and it only applies to routes in the Club's Route Library. These features are: (1) Turn-by-turn Navigation for iPhone and Android; (2) Offline Maps for iPhone and Android. The other paid features you get apply when you are accessing your RideWithGPS account through the web interface: (1) Estimated Time; (2) Advanced Turn Notifications (set different distance than default 30m) for TCX route download; (3) Print Custom Maps and Cue Sheets (these are quite nice, but require full page(s) of paper as opposed to the compressed narrow slips your route leaders create by hand for you).

Basically, the paid features you get are things that are applicable to our Club Routes. Things like live logging are applicable to just riding - even if you're on a Club Route, you may depart it in the middle of the ride (maybe even for 100 miles ) and then it makes sense that live logging would not apply.

I apologize if there's any confusion. I still think the Club Account is providing a benefit to NCCC members at only about $1/member - please let your voice be heard on what YOU think.

Just a thought regarding the RFLKT - many people use the little top tube mounted bags, so it seems that if a smart phone could fit, there should be no issues with tranmission to the RFLKT unit from the smart phone.

-Robert

Robert - blue tooth has no issues for me wherever I have my phone with the testing I've done so far. I keep it in my back jersey pocket. I think when this device first came out, there were issues with signal blocking. I haven't experienced that. This weekend's rides will be the first time I keep the RFLKT on for 4+ hr rides and will see if there is any loss of connectivity. Bluetooth can be finnicky, but it's working fine for me on my android phone.
Karl

Jim:
Re: Sharing ride status withe SO...
GLYMPSE App offers this feature. Available Android or iPhone.

Lou...

Hey, Jim
I wanted to alert you to the fact that group live logging has been available to all Club members since May 1 (I missed that announcement). See this post https://ridewithgps.com/help/whats-new-in-clubs and scroll down to May 1, 2016. I still haven't tried it yet and observed effect on battery life. You can somewhat control battery drain by setting your live logging interval to be more sparse. I would also like to compare phone battery use when paired with a Garmin Edge 820. It also has live tracking features of multiple riders and is probably less cumbersome since it doesn't require "Group" or "Club" membership, although there may be some Garmin Connect things you need to tweak. See this video on 820 live tracking.

My question is what enables a individual to be tracked by the 2 different applications. .In the Garmin case anyone in a group running Garmin connect on there cell phone would be able to be tracked. Then of course for those with a 820 you would have a heads up display. As well as  RWGPS everyone in the group would have to be running that app on there cell phone to be tracked.

More info on the 820
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvWVxs6oOJU

Just more clarifications on Group Live Logging for our Club Account. All it does is that the Club association is just like the Group association. So, instead of having to join some Group, which may not even exist, all Club members will automatically see each other when Live Logging. An interesting feature of that is that all our groups, Cruisers, Regular, Long would be visible at the same time so that when our rides intersected or got close to each other, it could look messy . You can figure out who is who by blowing up the screen and clicking on their icon, but not something to do while riding - there's enough distracted driving out there already!

But remember, Live Logging is a feature available only to paid RWGPS accounts, $50/yr for Basic (all you really need) and $80/yr for Premium. See Compare Plans for the differences in features.

But, after watching Nigel's videos on the 820, if I were getting a new Garmin today, the 820 would be the one for me.