Actually I’m impartial to the specific product; FitBit, jawbone, TomTom, Garmin. It’s the concept I’m in love with. Here’s why:
- It’s empowering: You set goals and you see progress. It’s you and your output, whether it be heart rate, steps, miles, sleep quality, or calories burned. It has nothing to do with the man in the white coat or his prescription pad.
- It’s motivational: And it’s easier than ever to see where you stand with fancy algorithms. Link in with your bff and inspire each other.
- It creates data points: This is personally what I love and what I’ll talk more about in later posts. You’ll hear a lot about VO2 max in sports science; HR monitoring is often used as a surrogate for this value as illustrated below. For the less-than Olympic athlete it’s a clever way to create training “zones”.
- It’s cool: You’re going to put something on your wrist anyway; chicks dig forearms. So why not get a heart rate out of it.
- It’s the future: Technology and sports science are exploding. And it should! Why would you spend 60min training when you could do it better in 30. Using science to supplement hard work is simply smarter.
