What iPhone apps are best to track my fitness prgress as I get back into shape?

July 27, 2009 2:12 PM

What iPhone apps can I use to track and manage my fitness progress?

I had surgery a few months ago, and am not ready to re-enter the gym. I am WAY out of shape, gained about 10 pounds. I go to a Muay Thai/Kickboxing gym, and have been given the all-clear from doctors and trainers alike to start working out there again.

I've also just gotten a new iPhone and would like to use an app or something to track my weight, diet, and workouts to move constructively towards getting fit. I feel like if I can see some incremental goals there, I'll stop focusing on feeling fat/out of breath all the time.

What apps do you recommend? I'm susceptible to "feature exhaustion," so simpler is better.

And any tips for losing weight and getting back on the horse after a long, medically-induced layoff are greatly appreciated as well.

Thanks!

posted by chinese_fashion to Health & Fitness (12 answers total)

Response by poster: Whoops. -- That first line should read: "I had surgery a few months ago, and am NOW ready to re-enter the gym."
posted by chinese_fashion at 2:17 PM on July 27, 2009

I've had good experiences with Lose It!, which helps you log your calorie intake and exercise to lose weight. It's currently free, the web site says it's for a limited time only. No ads. I think it's more responsive than the competing LiveStrong app, but the latter does have a larger database of foods.
posted by meowzilla at 2:30 PM on July 27, 2009

Weightbot definitely isn't a catch all solution (as it only covers weight over time) but it does have a beautiful interface and is very simple to use. I've personally lost 20 pounds since January 1 just by knowing my weight through Weightbot and trying to eat a little differently. It allows you to set a goal weight and view your progress over time with a few different graphical views and definitely worth a dollar to me.
posted by vmrob at 2:38 PM on July 27, 2009

I like iFitness, it's $1.99 and lets you create different routines and track your workouts as well as your weight (though you can't enter specific foods).
posted by crosbyh at 2:41 PM on July 27, 2009

I've had good luck with Lose It, mostly for its calorie counting abilities.
posted by Nelson at 2:55 PM on July 27, 2009

mapmyrun.com has a free iphone app imapmyrun.com that is pretty cool. It will track your run/walk/bike trip by its gps, then load the workout up to your web account... (even twitter it). You can use iphone for music while using the app, and it can overlay voice prompts with distance, pace etc during the workout.
posted by dripped at 3:36 PM on July 27, 2009

I used RunKeeperFree, which is similar to the above. But they're both for walking, running etc., i.e. they use location data to calculate distance travelled over time, they won't be much use figuring out how much energy you've expended in the gym or boxing ring.
posted by AmbroseChapel at 5:06 PM on July 27, 2009

True Weight is great for monitoring weight. It averages out the daily fluctuations to give you an idea of how much you are really gaining/losing in a month. Fitbeck Bodyweight is good for on the go workouts. Workouts is simple and quick for logging workouts, and customizable for people like me who use videos.
posted by JoannaC at 7:00 PM on July 27, 2009

I love the Livestrong app - it tracks food and workouts. Not great for weight routines, but for cardio and food tracking, it's pretty amazing.
posted by nometa at 7:22 PM on July 27, 2009

Response by poster: This is great, folks -- do you recommend anything for weight routines, too? As in, tracing weightlifting -- reps/sets/weight over time?
posted by chinese_fashion at 7:24 PM on July 27, 2009

I've been using WeightBot (mentioned above) for the past week or two. I was skeptical at first about paying a couple bucks for something that ONLY records weight. However, the simplicity of it and the awesomeness of the interface have motivated me to record my weight every single morning. Plus it shows your weight as a moving average (like the Hacker Diet and lots of other plans recommend) so it smooths out the bumps and daily fluctuations. I like it a lot.

I also use RunKeeper Pro to track my runs. The paid version introduced a killer feature for me recently: interval workouts. You can program a workout like: 5:00 warmup, 10:00 steady, 1 mile fast, 5:00 slow, 1 mile fast, 10:00 steady, 5:00 cooldown. And at each interval, you'll hear a chime and a voice prompt telling you what to do next. Perfect for anybody trying to follow a training plan that involves speed work or tempo runs.
posted by web-goddess at 10:18 PM on July 27, 2009

I've been using the Livestrong app for about a month now - I've had no complaints tracking food, workouts and weight. I used to use fitday.com on the web. Livestrong's iphone app is quite similar.
posted by soplerfo at 7:13 AM on July 28, 2009