In the 21st century world we live in there seems to be an app for everything. When it comes to our health and fitness is it really all necessary though? Well some of the biggest companies in the world clearly think so and Microsoft are the latest to join Apple, Samsung and Google at the party.
But we’ve been training for decades now and I wouldn’t say that as a species, humans have done too badly. That doesn’t mean technology can’t help us at all though. Let’s have a look at what Microsoft have come up with then:
Well their new smartwatch being called the Microsoft Band connects via Bluetooth to all of your devices to share a wide range of statistics. These include:
- Amount of steps you do in a day
- Sleep intensity
- Calories burned
- Heart rate
- Perspiration, UV exposure and skin temperature
The thing that makes this different to its competitors though is that you can connect the Band to all your devices, as well as other popular fitness apps like MyFitnessPal and RunKeeper.
Generally we know that all of these products and apps offer us similar things. You know how much exercise you do though, don’t you? So if you’re in the gym almost every day you might wonder whether counting your steps will really help.
Some of the other things just seem a bit pointless to people. Even if you track your exposure to UV for a whole year you won’t be getting any bigger in the gym. Essentially that’s how a lot of people feel: ‘okay it’s a helpful tool, but that’s about it’.
Everything you use to help your progress is a tool though. So asking whether an app is necessary is the same as asking if supplements are necessary. All of these things can help you to improve but they won’t do the work for you.
That’s what you need to remember! Whatever you are doing to aid your development is pointless if you start to completely rely on it and expect it to do the work for you.
If you understand that then these apps open up all kinds of possibilities. Maybe you aren’t getting the results you wanted – that is why these apps can be great! They track all sorts of things, as I mentioned earlier, and then what’s tracked can be compared to what you should be doing to meet the goals you specifically set.
Using this information you can then see where you might be underperforming. That’s not all that they do. The human memory is incredibly powerful but there isn’t any way that we can remember everything we do in the gym.
Monitoring is hugely important, you need to track your progress. Why? Well basically the way we progress is by pushing ourselves to do more over a period of time. Of course a notepad and a pen are just as effective but the technology is out there too.
As humans we have stayed fit for years before technology and that wouldn’t change if every single smartphone disappeared tomorrow.
Doing the research to write this blog has shown that there are so many people out there looking to make a penny or two from this industry and they don’t really care how they do it. But there are far more who are doing their bit to help!
Your success depends on you!
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