more fitness gadget musings
Jun. 13th, 2004 01:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
danaerisI'm writing from the downtown apple store.
Calculating ideal heart rate zone
Some of the fancier watches will measure the zone in which your heart rate should remain to have an effective workout as you warm up. Others simply calculate it based on formulas that remain the same.
How worthwhile is this added feature? Is it worth, say, $50?
Caloric intake calculations
Body fat scales will estimate your caloric intake based on ... ??
Heart rate watches can calculate your caloric expenditure for any given day based solely on your heart rate.
Which do you figure will give a more accurate number, if you're trying to eat for weight maintenance?
Impatience much?
Copeland Sports has the scale I want for $10 more than Amazon. Amazon has free shipping but it'll probably take a week to get here. Do I shell out $10 so I can have it sooner, or do I bite the bullet and order it online and be patient?
Still haven't nailed down which heart rate monitor to go for. I'm getting there, though.
Calculating ideal heart rate zone
Some of the fancier watches will measure the zone in which your heart rate should remain to have an effective workout as you warm up. Others simply calculate it based on formulas that remain the same.
How worthwhile is this added feature? Is it worth, say, $50?
Caloric intake calculations
Body fat scales will estimate your caloric intake based on ... ??
Heart rate watches can calculate your caloric expenditure for any given day based solely on your heart rate.
Which do you figure will give a more accurate number, if you're trying to eat for weight maintenance?
Impatience much?
Copeland Sports has the scale I want for $10 more than Amazon. Amazon has free shipping but it'll probably take a week to get here. Do I shell out $10 so I can have it sooner, or do I bite the bullet and order it online and be patient?
Still haven't nailed down which heart rate monitor to go for. I'm getting there, though.
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no subject
Date: 2004-06-13 03:26 pm (UTC)Some of the fancier watches will measure the zone in which your heart rate should remain to have an effective workout as you warm up. Others simply calculate it based on formulas that remain the same.
How worthwhile is this added feature? Is it worth, say, $50?
Being able to set/adjust the target heart-rate range is invaluable. Being able for instance to tell the device that I want 127 as my minimum target rate, or that I want my upper rate to alert at 164 rather than the 174 that it closer to my upper aerobic rate is very valuable. The sexier watches that will based on resting pulse rate compute oxygen uptake and therefore based on that upper and lower "safe" ranges, not so much. It's a useful thing to have, but the watch is still doing statistical estimation and the numbers it comes up with won't be significantly different than manual estimation formulas.
For example aerobic range is typically estimated as 60-90% of max heart rate with the tried and true 220-age for max heart rate [BPM]. (For me, for example, 220-30 = 190bpm) and then 60-90% = 114 to 171 bpm.
A better estimate = 210 - (1/2)age - 0.10*weight[pounds] (+ another 4 for males).
For example 210-15-(0.10*210)+4= 178. And then aerobic range is 107 to 160. And were I not in regular athlete shape that would be about spot perfect. At it happens, I prefer to estimate nearer to 65% and 80-85% (being over range is much more detrimental than being under.)
But the variability in those numbers is something that you can tell better from your own response than the wristwatch will. The important thing is being able to set the numbers that you want. Way very much not a $50 feature.
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From my experience, neither pulse monitors nor scales do a useful job of estimating caloric intake. The problem with pulse monitors (to my experience) is that they don't transition well between assuming that you're working out vs resting vs somewhere in between very well. Mine, for example, has me set a variable for "intensity of workout" on an 8 point scale or something to recognize the difference between a 120bpm pulse swimming, power walking on a treadmill, light jogging on that same treadmill, or in yoga and bases it's caloric output estimate on that. If you aren't twiddling that number 7 times a day then you likely aren't getting a great estimate.
Scales base their estimate on daily weight fluctuation and some use input about lifestyle activity level.
Frankly, you're going to get a MUCH better estimate just from keeping weightwatchers points (do I recall right that you're counting points these days?) If one generally avoids high fat-content foods and puts any effort at all into seeking sources of fiber then the base 50cal/point rate is generally correct and needn't include all of the fat/fiber adjustments. (FYI - the WW points scale is:
total points = (calories - 10*grams.fiber)/50 + grams.fat/12
which simplifies nicely
to: = (calories + 10*(4*grams.fat - grams.fiber))/50
or: = (calories + 10*(calories.fat - grams.fiber))/50
There's also a GREAT resource at http://www.dwlz.com for nutrition guides for many foods in general as well as many many restaurants.