I'm very grateful to ChrisS

[Wowbagger]

A while back I expressed concern about my sleep. Chris suggested getting one of these as they log your sleeping patterns. They do, and a lot more besides. As a result of buying this I am doing a lot more walking and trying to meet the targets every day of 10,000 paces, 5 miles walked, 3250 calories burned, a daily calorie deficit of about 500, at least 30 "very active" minutes and 10 flights of stairs climbed. After 3 weeks of this I already feel a lot better and I've lost about 3kg.

I haven't done a lot of cycling though.

[Chris S]

 

I found it very motivating. They're not so good at measuring exercise, but that's fine - there are other things if you want to get into all that (Heart Rate Monitors etc) - FitBits are great at measuring activity; NEAT I think is the technical term, and that's what you want to increase if you can; because sitting around a lot is fundamentally Very Bad for us.

And the night-time log can be very revealing - exposing just how restless (or otherwise) you are.

Glad to hear it's working out!

[Kim]

That also looks like a reasonable modern alternative to a ShakeAwake, for people who like their tech a bit less 1985 (and consequently can't just use their phone because it spends the night sucking up electrons).

[Sergeant Pluck]

A while back I expressed concern about my sleep. Chris suggested getting one of these as they log your sleeping patterns. They do, and a lot more besides. As a result of buying this I am doing a lot more walking and trying to meet the targets every day of 10,000 paces, 5 miles walked, 3250 calories burned, a daily calorie deficit of about 500, at least 30 "very active" minutes and 10 flights of stairs climbed. After 3 weeks of this I already feel a lot better and I've lost about 3kg.

I haven't done a lot of cycling though.

Interesting - and seems to be working well for you. The targets: do you set these yourself? Calorie deficit: how do you enter your intake?

It’s a pity it wasn’t £30 or £40, then I’d be seriously tempted.

[Feline]

I have one of those, but it's completely useless for logging activity when i have to drive anywhere (but am walking around when I get there). Mine logged me climbing around 10,000 stairs during a 20 mile drive over the mendips. Plus I cannot turn it off when I want to ....

[Wowbagger]

That's curious. Mine logs nothing when I'm driving. It logged rather more flights of stairs climbed today that was the reality. I put that down to the fact that I was walking around in a gusty wind and its means of detecting climbing is via a pressure-sensitive chip.

I think it's a bit parsimonious when it comes to allocating calories burnt when cycling.

@Sgt. Pluck: I've been weighing my food and checking against packaging. There is a fair bit of guesswork involved, eg for Mrs. Wow's excellent Beef Stew. I set the target that I wanted to lose 25kg in 9 months. I am running a calorie deficit according to the gizmo and its associated website, but not as much as I should be.

[Chris S]

That's curious. Mine logs nothing when I'm driving. It logged rather more flights of stairs climbed today that was the reality. I put that down to the fact that I was walking around in a gusty wind and its means of detecting climbing is via a pressure-sensitive chip.

Same here - logs nothing when driving. It does however react to cycling - even when not worn (it was in a pannier); I guess in those circumstances it measures potholes .

Plus I cannot turn it off when I want to ....

Why would you want to? Mine's been on continuously for about 18 months now; very occasionally I'll forget it, but that doesn't happen often.

[Wowbagger]

Mine reacts to cycling as well, but I haven't done much on the bike since I bought the Fitbit. My therefore very limited experience seems to indicate that it under-records calories burned when cycling - at least, I was a lot more knackered after a slow 18 tandem miles than the Fitbit's recorded calories burned indicated that I ought to be. I suppose it doesn't know that she's not pedalling at the back. 

[Dibdib]

My recollection is that if you set the time spent cycling as an activity (in the webapp, or via a link to Strava or similar) then it should discount the steps recorded by the Fitbit in that time period. Unfortunately I've given away my Fitbit Flex so I can't test it. What I did find, which was incredibly annoying, was that the shaking of the bars would often be mistaken for the "tapping" gesture to start/stop sleep mode. That's largely why I stopped using mine.

I never noticed any really obvious recording issues from driving, but I rarely spend that much time in the car and never looked that closely.

[Thing2]

I've just splashed out on a charge hr. I was mostly interested in the wrist based heart rate feature as I don't wear a hrm when commuting etc and was interested in getting a better resting heart rate as well as more accurate daily calorie consumption figure (for a fairly active job). I've found that the heart rate readings tend to be low at high heart rates, but it's still really useful. It turns out I've been underestimating my calorie consumption, which is why I've been struggling to stick to the plan.

[Wowbagger]

I have just returned from a slow 29 mile ride. It was actually quite fast for me.

Fitbit logged 13140 steps and 123 flights of stairs climbed, as well as 6 miles walked, but 0 "very active" minutes. If I had been putting as much energy into walking as I was into cycling then it would have logged 180-ish very active minutes.

When I told it the time and duration of my bike rides, which basically was 14 miles out to 11ses and 14 miles back, even though nearly all the climbing was done on the outward leg, it logged 0 active minutes for that, but on the way back in which the 14 miles took me about 70 minutes, all of them were logged as active. It also told me that my second 14 miles involved burning more calories than the first 14, and that is a lie.

So it isn't all that clever at measuring cycling activity.

I'll take a look at the Garmin track and see how much climbing that counted up. 1230' seems to be quite a bit in 28 miles of Essex.

[Feline]

That's curious. Mine logs nothing when I'm driving. It logged rather more flights of stairs climbed today that was the reality. I put that down to the fact that I was walking around in a gusty wind and its means of detecting climbing is via a pressure-sensitive chip.

Same here - logs nothing when driving. It does however react to cycling - even when not worn (it was in a pannier); I guess in those circumstances it measures potholes .

Plus I cannot turn it off when I want to ....

Why would you want to? Mine's been on continuously for about 18 months now; very occasionally I'll forget it, but that doesn't happen often.

I would rather turn it off when driving or cycling to work so I don't get a bunch of 'trophies' for climbing 10,000 flights of stairs I didn't climb 
Unfortunately I do a lot of walking when I'm working so it's a bit useless to have to leave it behind.

[Wowbagger]

I forgot to mention above: my telling it that pretty well all of today's activity was done on a bike made no difference to the number of steps. It did increase the number of calories burned though.

[L CC]

I set mine up to talk to endomondo so it knows when I'm utility cycling,or at the gym, or that I've left it in a locker because I'm swimming.
It all depends what you're using it for, doesn't it?

Mostly mine's used to say "haha, I did more steps than you" to Mr Smith. Unless he did more, in which case obviously we don't mention it.
I like a measure of what I've 'done' even if I do nothing with that data. The thing I don't use it for is measuring sleep- the wrist thingy is quite irritating on my wrists when I'm trying to sleep.

I don't count calories- there's only any point if you believe the calories in/calories out myth massive oversimplification is all there is to weight loss, and I don't.

[Wowbagger]

I'll take a look at the Garmin track and see how much climbing that counted up. 1230' seems to be quite a bit in 28 miles of Essex.

The Garmin track is in broad agreement with the Fitbit on elevation data for yesterday's ride.

Total Ascent:   1356   ft   
Total Descent:   1353   ft   
Start Elevation:   21   ft   
End Elevation:   24   ft
Min Elevation:   11   ft
Max Elevation:   253   ft

The Garmin track uses metres so that quote, from the Bikehike elevation data, has been converted. I started the track at the café in Wickford High Street where your CTC group meets and ended it at Wickford station, a little up the hill from there - although I would have thought more than 3' higher, but not by much. Come to think of it, I finished the ride at platform level and the start of the ride was very close to the railway bridge, so the difference must have been more like 20'.

I have also taken the ride duration from the Garmin and entered that on the Fitbit log. It was actually 1 hour 41 minutes for the outward journey, 1 hour 18 minutes for the return. Different routes, but pretty well identical distances. The outward route involved a net gain of about 30 metres and also a couple of short stops. Different ride leader out and back, and I don't think I stopped at all on the return as I was always the back marker and this guy likes to get on with it. Fitbit still logged the return route as 78 very active minutes whereas the out route didn't count as being active.

[Chris S]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-31113602

TBH, a lot of what you get from an activity monitor, is bollocks.

For a start, it can't ever know how many calories you are burning. The only way to determine this is by living inside a metabolic chamber, or briefly on a VO2/VCO2 test, wearing a mask and having your breath analysed. So ignore anything that tries to predict the calories you're burning. For the record, although I monitor my food/activity (I use MFP), it's only to keep an eye on macros - I pretty much ignore calories.

Secondly - I ignore the "distance" measurement my FitBit gives me. I've given it an approximate stride side - but it's going to be so approximate, not to mention variable, that it's probably rubbish. It's definitely rubbish when cycling - I'll record something like 35,000-40,000 "steps" when riding a 200, so the web app gives me 35-40km of distance. 

What activity monitors do is measure movement, and you can keep a record of this and use it to compare one day against another - and for that they're pretty handy. Also, movement/activity at night can be approximated to sleep quality.

I find if you work within those parameters, and apply some interpretation, it's fine.

[Regulator]

I've used a FitBit One, then I moved onto the FitBit Flex.

I then had a Withings Pulse and I've now moved onto the Withings Activite Pop, which is proving to be excellent.

[L CC]

After I lost it in Barcelona I spent quite a long time looking at the options, assuming that things would have moved on since we first got the fitbits however many moons ago. I opted for another One.

I might have gone with the Withings if I'd seen it, but I'm an android gal, so probably not. Wearing (wi)things on my wrist is a bit of a no-no since the metalwork's been in but that looks quite good.

[Thing2]

I've had a Withings Pulse  O2 on loan for a while. It's pedometer readings are far lower than the Fitbit, but it's less comfortable (for me) to wear. I have warn both of them overnight to try them, but it's not something I plan to do on a regular basis. Having a mini USB connector on the side didn't seem like the best design in the world for the Pulse either. The oxidization monitoring seems like a bit of a gimmick too. It sometimes took multiple attempts to get a heart rate or oxidization reading, and the I could get a 2% difference in oxidization reading within a minute (which is as much variation as I ever saw over 3 weeks). If you have asthma (or other respiratory issues), then it might be useful, but you'd be much better off with a proper fingertip monitor.

As Chris S says, all fitness monitoring devices are actually rubbish at giving accurate figures for steps, calories etc. They are a useful tool for encouraging people to do more activity, which is a GOOD thing. My colleague says that several members of her family can be regularly found pacing around the house at 11:30 pm making sure they reach their target steps for the day (and beat another family member).

[Chris S]

As Chris S says, all fitness monitoring devices are actually rubbish at giving accurate figures for steps, calories etc. They are a useful tool for encouraging people to do more activity, which is a GOOD thing. My colleague says that several members of her family can be regularly found pacing around the house at 11:30 pm making sure they reach their target steps for the day (and beat another family member).

Actually, I was quite careful (maybe not careful enough!) to make the distinction between "steps" and "distance". My experience is that my FitBit and my Galaxy S5 are both quite good, and consistent, in measuring "steps". Interpreting that into "distance" however, requires too many assumptions and approximations as neither device cross-checks that step count with a GPS trace.

Either way - the word "steps" in this context is also misleading, but "unit of activity" is an unwieldy, if more accurate alternative.

[Polar Bear]

This BBC article doesn't exactly rate such gadgets.   

I can see the motivational aspect but I can achieve most of that myself with Strava and a quick look down at my gut! 

[Thing2]

As Chris S says, all fitness monitoring devices are actually rubbish at giving accurate figures for steps, calories etc. They are a useful tool for encouraging people to do more activity, which is a GOOD thing. My colleague says that several members of her family can be regularly found pacing around the house at 11:30 pm making sure they reach their target steps for the day (and beat another family member).

Actually, I was quite careful (maybe not careful enough!) to make the distinction between "steps" and "distance". My experience is that my FitBit and my Galaxy S5 are both quite good, and consistent, in measuring "steps". Interpreting that into "distance" however, requires too many assumptions and approximations as neither device cross-checks that step count with a GPS trace.

Either way - the word "steps" in this context is also misleading, but "unit of activity" is an unwieldy, if more accurate alternative.

True. I should have said 'distance'.

I was interested to see the difference in the number of steps measured by the Withings and Fitbit, and found the Withings device to have fewer steps gained by non walking activities (yes, I wore one on each wrist for an afternoon, with the Fitbit on my non dominant hand - so you can't blame it on that). However, if I'm standing still and sorting items from one box to many (often involving throwing aforementioned item), it's still activity. Generally speaking the Fitbit measures it as such, whereas the Withings doesn't.

I haven't seen any reports of whether the Fitbit Surge tries to cross reference 'distance' with it's GPS track. It could get complicated fairly quickly however, and the real beauty of these things is that the interface is not complicated (and is therefore accessible).

[Wowbagger]

It is normally Dez's job to do the dog's late-night walk. It's often the only time he goes out during the entire day, as he works at home earning vast sums. A few times lately I have taken the dog out in the middle of the evening in order to meet my steps target and he has been heard (not by me!) complaining that I have take the dog out, depriving him of his only fresh air of the day.

There's nothing to stop him taking the dog out again. I can't imagine Morphy turning round and sayingg "Oh Got! Not another walk?"

[L CC]

This BBC article doesn't exactly rate such gadgets.   

I can see the motivational aspect but I can achieve most of that myself with Strava and a quick look down at my gut! 

Strava is loathsome competitiveness and your gut motivates me not a jot . I don't think walking more will shrink mine, it's more about being less apathetic. I do a sedentary job. Wearing the Fitbit means I'm more likely to walk down to goods in to correct their errors than phone the guys there to do it.
I can't imagine Strava helping me do that.

[Chris S]

This BBC article doesn't exactly rate such gadgets.   

I can see the motivational aspect but I can achieve most of that myself with Strava and a quick look down at my gut! 

Strava is loathsome competitiveness and your gut motivates me not a jot . I don't think walking more will shrink mine, it's more about being less apathetic. I do a sedentary job. Wearing the Fitbit means I'm more likely to walk down to goods in to correct their errors than phone the guys there to do it.
I can't imagine Strava helping me do that.

Why use Strava for loathsome competitiveness when we can do that between ourselves? 

(fboab nearly always beats me).