Day 5 into our Girlie Gadgets review of the Fibit Tracker we are starting to see the benefits of the system beyond the pedometer alone. Still struggling with limited connectivity where we are staying, we have managed to get online and look through the dashboard of our fitbit.com account to see that we can track blood pressure, weight, BMI and of course our caloric intake for the day. Still not willing to get serious on the diet tracker with only a couple more days in paradise filled with Pina Coladas, it is become abundantly clear (and we mean abundantly) that in spite of stepping between 12 and 15,000 steps that we aren’t hitting the 2000 calorie burn. yikes! That is the good thing though, without even tracking food intake (yet) one can easily see if they are eating too much and/or not exercising too much. Back to reality next week, we will start inputting food consumed each day but mean time the surf is breaking, the palm trees are swaying and the beach is only 85 steps away.
Might be worth mentioning to your readers that the FitBit Ultra also keeps track of how many flights of stairs you’ve climbed in a day. As far as I can tell it counts 20 stair steps as one flight of stairs. The stair cases at my office building are a bit longer and have 26 steps per flight, so I get the satisfaction of racking up those flights fast!
I’m still eating deserts and drinking beer, etc. but by simply endeavoring to not exceed my recommended daily calories and just making the effort to be more active, I’ve been able to lose 5 pounds a month for the past three months (15 pounds and counting)! Again, this is without joining a gym or creating a hardcore workout regiment – who knows how quickly the pounds would melt if I were more than casually serious about weight loss.
I’ve been using the LoseIt! App (and web site), which is compatible with the FitBit (FitBit syncs over an exercise adjustment when I’ve burned enough calories to merit it), but if I hadn’t started on LoseIt! first, I’m sure using the calorie tracking on the FitBit site would do just fine – I just prefer the LoseIt! App interface – prettier food pictures. lol. Between the FitBit passively track my activity and using an App (in my case, LoseIt!) to actively track my calorie intake, I have genuinely useful tools to keep me aware of what/how I’m doing. Being able to just check the FitBit and go, “Oh, I just need three more flights of stairs to hit my daily goal (20)” or “Ooh, I’m a thousand steps shy of my walking goal – another 10 minutes on the elliptical will take care of that” makes it really simple to stay on track.
Stop “wishing” you’d lose weight. Be slightly less lazy like me and lose a1+ pound a week. Or get hardcore and lose even more! The point is this: get some of this tech, apply minimal effort and, if you start today, you too could be 20 pounds lighter by the 4th of July!