I Learned Two Things Yesterday...

#1. Going for a walk in my chunky work heels feels fine when I start out, but feels like I am walking on razor blades by the time I get home.  A 10 minute walk is fine in these shoes.  A 25 minute walk is stupid.  Mental note: change into walking shoes before trying that again.

#2. GPS reception in downtown Toronto is really craptacular, what with all the towers. 

The GPS track for my walk home last night looks more like a random drunk walk than a track of where I actually walked, as you can see from the trace, above.  You have my word that I did not do nearly as many loop-de-loops as is suggested here, nor did I tunnel through several buildings.  You can trust that I am lazy enough to take the most direct route places on most occasions, even when I am going out of my way to do so - - no loop-de-loops for me!

Last night, in a fit of enthusiasm (no doubt brought on by lack of chocolate), I decided that instead of doing the direct 4 block walk to my apartment (which takes all of 8 minutes), I would walk one block west and then one block north before heading back for home.  I tracked my walk with the Runkeeper app, and along the way I kept checking to make sure that I had a GPS signal. 

I had a GPS signal all right, but I work in the financial district, at King and Bay street for the locals, which is essentially a forest of skyscrapers in all directions.  If it isn't the office buildings, it's the new condos that are springing up like mushrooms wherever there is undeveloped or underdeveloped land.  There are sidewalks that are constantly in shadow from all the towers, a reality which I find a little bit sad. 

As you can see, all of those towers do a really good job of reflecting GPS signals all over the place, turning what is otherwise a fairly straightforward walk into something much more exciting looking. 

When I got home I was initially thrilled to see that I had [allegedly] walked 1.8 miles, at least according to Runkeeper.  When I looked at the map, however, I saw why the mileage was so high - - the GPS had me walking three steps back for every one step forward, making extra laps of some areas and completely skipping others.  While I trust that I did walk 25 minutes (at least according to my sore feet), the mileage is completely fictitious.  Too bad - I would have liked to see how it turned out.  But this neighborhood is brutal for GPSs, at least the commercial kind in my iPhone.

#3. [I know, I said I learned 2 things when there are really 3 things.  There are always 3 things with me, and you just need to get used to it].  Wearing a suit when going on a walk is a really stupid idea.  I sweat like a linebacker at the best of times, and doing so whilst wearing a black suit is just plain uncomfortable.

Lesson learned - - my next intentional walk will be in appropriate sweat-wicking clothing,  with comfortable walking shoes.  The hiking shoes and workout shirt I have worn on my past few walks are perfect for just this kind of thing.  Almost as if they were designed for walking.  Hmmm...

Taking a Stroll with the DigiFit and Runkeeper Apps

Tonight my partner and I took a short walk this evening with an eye to comparing how the DigiFit app tracks a walk versus the Runkeeper app.

DigiFit

First, I looked at the DigiFit app.  Starting a walk was just as easy as starting a workout from home with the Quickstart feature.  The app tracked my heart rate using a Garmin ANT+ adapter and chest band, and assigned my heart rate to different workout zones, depending on the intensity of the workout over time.

As you can see from the screen shot, above, the app calculated that I had walked 1.74 miles in 40 minutes, for around 253 calories expended.  Because the app works with my heart rate monitor, it also displays my average and maximum beats per minute. 

The app will also count out the 10 minute intervals walked, but I had the sound off so that I did not hear any of the interval counts or other commentary from the app. 

Although the DigiFit app calculates my average pace and distance and time travelled, it does not calculate the pace/hour. 

Positives:  heart rate monitor integration with heart rate zone graph; quick and easy to use; straightforward; permits notes to be added to walk/run; GPS/map functionality; tracks elevation; part of an overall health tracking app that also includes ability to track blood pressure, sleep, and resting heart rate.

Negatives: does not calculate mph pace speed; DigiFit occasionally drops workouts off my list of completed workouts if the app is not synched with the server immediately after the workout; GPS has been known to drop completely in high scatter environments, like downtown Toronto in the midst of office towers.

Runkeeper
I have to admit that this was the first time that I used the Runkeeper app, and I only downloaded it at all because of its integration with my Gym-Pact app.  Officially starting next week, qualifying walks/runs/cycles tracked using the Runkeeper app will count as workouts for Gym-Pact. 

Initially, the app is much like the DigiFit app.  Runkeeper, too, calculates time, mileage, expended calories, and also has a GPS/mapping function. 

Unlike DigiFit, Runkeeper actually calculates my average speed, which I really like (given my poor math skills). 

However my Garmin ANT+ heart rate monitor does not work with the Runkeeper app, which has its own proprietary partner.  This is a pain in the butt, because I am not going on walks festooned with heart rate monitors over every exposed piece of skin just because my apps do not play well together.  Because DigiFit provides the nice chart showing the heart rate zones, I am staying with the heart monitoring functionality on the DigiFit app, rather than the Runkeeper app for now.

The Runkeeper app also has some sort of commentary, but I had to turn the sound off because the app also triggered by iPod to start playing.  The app permits you to select your playlist (which I did), but it started playing some random song from a different playlist, and I could not figure out how to shut the thing down.  Perhaps I am a Luddite who is unaccustomed to technology, but I hate when apps do things I do not specifically instruct them to do - - like turn on my music full blast. 

As you can see from the screen shot, above, the map and summary readout is very similar to the DigiFit app, although it provides the information in a slightly different format.  For some reason, even though I was taking the same walk at the same time, where the DigiFit had me walking 1.74 miles in 40 minutes, Runkeeper had me walking 1.85 miles in almost 43 minutes.  I can understand a minute's difference, since I started the apps running sequentially, but 3 minutes?  and a tenth of a mile difference?  The calorie count is also much higher (390 versus 253), but that is likely due to an estimate based on weight, rather than DigiFit's estimate which is based on weight + heart rate.

Positives: easy to use; permits heart rate tracker integration (although I did not use it); integrated with Gym-Pact; GPS/map functionality; calculates pace in mph; permits the user to set goals (e.g. miles walked or length of walk); tracks elevation.

Negatives: turned on my music unexpectedly; you can expect the GPS to drop in high scatter environments, just like the DigiFit GPS; heart rate monitor functionality requires special equipment; dedicated app only tracks walks/runs/cycles.

Overall, the DigiFit does more things, but I suspect the Runkeeper is better at the one thing that it does.  Everything in the Runkeeper app is designed around that single aspect, namely, tracking  workouts.  DigiFit tracks much more than merely workouts, but it tracks workouts well. 

I will continue to try both for now, to see if I can work out that "playing music unintentionally" thing that happened last night.  I will continue to defer to DigiFit's calorie counts (they are more accurate because of the heart rate monitor) and will use whichever mileage calculation is more conservative. 

I have been walking quite a bit lately, and am beginning to feel it in my left knee and right groin, so I am going to take a break from walking until Friday or Saturday, to give my body a chance to recover.