By Blake Beckcom
As every aspect of our lives becomes more automated, it’s no surprise that the variety of fitness gadgets on the market is growing at an exponential rate. Whether you’re interested in tracking heart rate, calories, miles, steps or blood pressure, there’s a fitness gadget out there to meet your needs. If you’re in the market to digitally and automatically track your fitness journey, here are some guidelines to help you decipher what’s what in today’s fitness gadget world.
Identify your favorite activity, fitness goals to find the best device
The most popular fitness gadgets that people are using today include:
Nike Fuel Band: Keeps your calories in check, tracks your steps throughout the day and allows you to compete with other people by uploading your daily data via a docking system or the cloud. $99.
JawBone UP: Tracks food and drink consumption, steps and activity levels and sleep patterns. It also helps you commit to personalized goals, as well as share them with your friends. $50 – $180.
Strava: This running and cycling online GPS tracking and performance program allows you to track your runs, rides and cross-training activities from your Garmin, Android or iPhone. You can view distance maps of your activities, see your time splits from one mile to the next, monitor personal bests and compete with your friends. Try the free version or upgrade to “premium” for $6 per month.
Fitness video games
Individuals and families alike can increase their fitness levels with various fitness-oriented video games for the Xbox, Wii or PS3. These devices can provide personalized workouts in the privacy of your own home and can be great ways for parents and kids to work out together.
Smart Scales
These wireless scales not only track weight, body fat percentage and BMI, but they also automatically sync your statistics to online graphs and tools that can help you see the bigger picture as you progress toward your weight loss goals.
Devices collect data, not solve problems
Fitness gadgets can be great tools for helping guide you through your fitness journey and motivate you to maintain a consistent level of activity, but you still have to put in the work to meet your health and fitness goals. Buying a fitness gadget won’t solve your internal struggles to live a healthy and fit lifestyle, but it can help you be accountable to yourself and any people you choose to share your fitness information with.
In order to use these tools to meet your goals, it’s important to understand the numbers and information they track. If you don’t know what the appropriate range is for your specific heart rate or if you get caught up in comparing numbers with other people who may have different goals and body types, then you may not be using your fitness gadget in the most effective manner.
You need to understand what maximum heart rate is and what all of the numbers you’re monitoring mean specifically to you. Our Fitness Together trainers help our clients understand what their heart rate and other levels should be during different activities so they can effectively use their fitness gadgets while training and throughout their everyday life.
It’s all about the cloud
As fitness gadgets continue to provide ease of use for people to track, store and share their health and fitness levels, the wearable fitness band market will continue increasing in popularity. As technology continues to evolve, such as the ability to automatically upload and store data in the cloud, the possibilities for advancing the functionality of fitness gadgets will evolve as well.
Looking forward, Apple will soon be releasing their much anticipated health and fitness gadget, the iWatch, which may be a game changer in the industry, as it will track more than just activity levels and basic heart rate information. This comprehensive health tracker is anticipated to detect more in-depth body and health functionality, such as blood pressure and glucose levels, as well as detailed fitness activity levels.
It’s definitely an exciting time for the fitness gadget market and time will only tell what’s in store for the future of tracking, monitoring, storing and sharing your health and fitness information.
—Blake Beckcom runs Fitness Together Mission Hills with his wife Gwen. Contact them at fitnesstogether.com/missionhills.
