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Making Every Step Count with Fitbug

Strenua — Wed, 26 May 2010 09:01:20 +0000

It’s been 10 days since I started my Fitbug challenge. I have religiously worn my bug all day everyday and I can see how it can be motivational as you become addicted to clocking up the steps. Through also wearing my GPS sports watch I soon discovered that around 2,200 of my steps are equal to about a mile. A mile that is of walking.

I normally walk 3.2miles to work which was clocking around 7,000 steps but one day I was late so had to jog the last mile. As I looked at my bug I was distraught to see I had only added 6,000 steps. I know that the bug only counts steps and as I was jogging my steps would have been longer and fewer, but I was disappointed that putting in more effort meant that I had less recorded steps.

Over the lovely sunny weekend I wore dresses where I couldn’t attach my bug to my waist band so I carried the bug in my shoulder bag but then forgot to put it on my clothes when I got to work. I was annoyed with myself when I realised I missed recording another 2,000 steps, but when I got home found I had the expected number of steps as if I had worn the bug all day. Obviously letting the bug bounce around in my bag wasn’t as accurate as wearing it on my waist so I will have to be careful about accepting the counts if it’s in my bag all day.

Although there are community challenges on the website to record the highest number of step count, ultimately the bug is there as motivation to keep me active and tone up so there is no point in trying to trick the bug as I would only be cheating myself. I will have to experiment this week though to see if jogging with the bug in my bag equals each other out and I end up with the same number of steps if I walked wearing it.

As this was my first week I didn’t have any goals I just had to eat as normal and record everything on the website. Unfortunately I got tonsillitis and for two and a half days I couldn’t swallow or eat or drink anything so I had nothing to update my profile with. Then on Sunday I get a text message saying ‘Don’t be a slug…Update your bug!’. Looking back it was nice to get the reminder text and know that Fitbug was still supporting and motivating me, although at the time I did want to text back ‘Leave me alone I’M ILL.’

In spite of my incomplete first week profile, Fitbug was able to make some recommendations of:

Step Target 19,500
Aerobic Step Target 6,600
Calories consumed 2,000

I’ll let you know if I manage to reach the targets next week. If you have already a Fitbug member then don’t forget I have set up a league for Strenua’s World and I hope readers will join the league for some friendly rivalry and motivation.

If you wish to join me Fitbug.com are offering a 25% Discount to all new customers, simply enter this promotional code ‘SPRING10’ in the appropriate section which is valid until 30th June 2010.

Will catching the Fitbug keep me motivated?

Strenua — Sun, 16 May 2010 14:06:13 +0000

Whilst it is easy to decide to start being more active it is hard to keep motivated after the initial enthusiasm has worn off. Fitbug is a web based service which aims to keep you motivated to keep moving. Described as ‘a personal health and well-being coach’, Fitbug is a unique system that’s been designed to help individuals to achieve their weight, fitness and health goals within their everyday routine.

This week I received my Fitbug ‘bug’ which I am going to trial for the next 3 months. Fitbug.com is a place where you can record your nutritional intake, connect with the fitbug community through its forum and take part in activity challenges. You also have a ‘bug’, a more sophisticated type of pedometer which then talks to fitbug.com to update how active you have been.

Day one was just the ‘getting to know you’ phase. For the first week the program likes to get to know your normal activity level, what you normally eat and what your goals are. I had to complete the online questionnaire, admitting to my poor diet and as my goal is to tone up I had to record my hips, thighs, waist, chest and arm measurements.

I also have to record what I eat for at least 3 days in the nutritional area. This is an area that took quick a while to complete, although that I imagine it will get quicker as you develop your favourite food tab. The nutritional information for nearly 18,000 food products are already listed to select: 6,000 from Tesco, 3,000 from Somerfield and 4,600 from ASDA with 1,400 non branded food such as fruit and vegetables. However, I had to personally fill in the nutritional information from my Sainsbury’s Pizza and my Mars Bar (I admit my diet is bad) had more calories than were written on the packet. I presume this is down to brands shrinking the size of their products rather than the fitbug data being entered incorrectly so I will have to check the calories are correct when I add new foods to my nutritional diary.

The interesting part of the fitbug program is the ‘bug’. I’ve called it a pedometer but it is more sophisticated than just a step counter. It records what time you achieved the steps as well as if they were aerobic steps such as going for a brisk walk, or if they were just walking around the house. After 24 hours I had accumulated 23,000 steps with 16,000 being aerobic steps. This was achieved by my 3.2mile walk to work that took around 7,200 steps each way and 3 hours of teaching swimming that involved 5,000 steps. It does however highlight when you have been lazy or sitting down as I was on Saturday watching the F1 qualifying and then the FA cup final on TV. It clearly shows I didn’t do much between 1-5pm. But luckily I don’t have to feel too guilty this week as the program just likes to record a baseline of your average daily activity, although all the steps do count towards the community challenges. These include the Mount Everest Challenge and the Fantasy Footfall where your total monthly steps can pit you against other people from your country or county. You can also set up a mini league for your friends or Family so I have set up a league for Stenua’s World and I hope readers will join the league for some friendly rivalry and motivation.

I’m planning on reporting back on how I get on with the Fitbug program over the next few months and will let you know how I have got on after my first assessment week. If you wish to join me Fitbug.com are offering a 25% discount to all new customers, simply enter this promotional code ‘SPRING10’ in the appropriate section which is valid until 30th June 2010.

Running for Charity? – Make the most of your Marathon Sponsorship

Strenua — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 15:08:25 +0000

In spite of the Royal Mail strike over 120,000 people will be looking out for the postman today in the hope he delivers them an acceptance magazine for the 2010 Virgin London Marathon. Even if you were successful and don’t have to consider the golden bond option, for those of us with a ‘congratulations you are in’ magazine, there are still pages of charities wanting you to raise money for them.

I’ve never been a fan of Golden Bond places. Rather than the ballot entry fee of £30 the charities have to pay around £350 for a golden bond place which they have to recoup from the money you raise. If you feel passionate about raising money for a given charity, there are many big city marathons run around the same time as London you could enter for £30 or less, with more of your hard earned sponsorship money given to the charity directly.

If you desperately want to run London, there is no need to get your friends and family to pay for your impatience by thinking they are donating to charity, when really they are mainly just contributing towards your entry fee. You will get a guaranteed place if you have been rejected 5 times and there is probably a good chance you would have got in through the ballot by that time. You could train harder and get a good for age time for next year. Or if you train extra hard and get a championship time by January 2010 you will still be able to race in April 2010

If you are a member of a running club, they have club places available. The regular competitive club runners will probably have their own places through either full or half marathon times, so if you want to run London for the first time, joining and becoming active in a club will probably lead to a club place offered to you next year.

If you have been lucky to get your own place in the 2010 VLM and want to fund raise for a charity then Virgin are now providing a more cost effective way to collect money. In the past most of us have had a JustGiving.com page for fund raising and it does have it’s benefits. Adding a link to your facebook page or sending out an email to friends you don’t see personally, is an easy way to encourage sponsorship and they collect gift aid for you. But they do this for a charge. A £10 donation can also reclaim £2.82 from the government as gift aid, yet JustGiving take 5% as a transaction fee (64p) plus VAT at 15% (10p) along with the credit card fee of 15p resulting in a whopping cost to the charity of 89p. Over 10 years £526m has been raised through JustGiving. Transaction fees of 5% would have earned them £26.3 million, that’s paying for some impressive overhead costs.

But with Virgin sponsoring the London marathon now they have set up Virgin Money Giving as a non profit making company to help you raise more money by only charging 2% as a transaction fee (card fees are the same) so the total cost to the charity is only 35p from a £10 donation.

Obviously the most effective way would be to get post dated cheques from your sponsors that you promise to cash only if you finish the race, ensure you get their permission to claim gift aid and then the charity gets to keep all 128% of your donated money. But if you are planning on a fund raising event and want on online sponsorship page for any event (it’s not limited only to VLM runners) then Virgin Money Giving (virginmoneygiving.com) could be the most effective way to collect your donations.

Make supermarkets your next stop for sport and leisure equipment

Strenua — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 19:22:09 +0000

Supermarkets used to be the place to go just for food and household products but over the last few years they have been branching out with their own clothing ranges and stocking household appliances. Now if you want to improve your health and fitness, a visit to Sainsbury’s no longer has to end at stocking up on fruit and vegetables or a visit to their pharmacy. Sainsbury’s now has a range of sport and leisure products online from elliptical cross trainers to dumb bells, pedometers to sculpting balls.

It’s not only home fitness equipment you can buy either. Whatever is your favourite outdoor sport they probably now cater for you too. Sainsbury’s online now sell badminton and tennis rackets, cricket and football sets, fishing tackle, cycles and golf clubs. As a swimming instructor I was also impressed by the wide range of swimming accessories often not even stocked in specialist sport shops, such as children’s sun protection floatation suits.

So next time you need some leading brand sports equipment there’s no need to just stick to departments stores and sports shops, with next day delivery available it’s just as convenient to visit online supermarkets.