So, I know I said I would write the next day about how my first day was with Bodymedia Link but... I just knew if I did, I would be bragging to no end about how great the product was without any more than 12 hrs or so of use.
Here we are it's now Monday, 4 days later, and I am thoroughly impressed with all that it has taught me about my body.
Things I Learned (so far)
First: I had no idea that on an average day I was burning close to 2000 calories without busting my butt.
Second: I learned that busting my butt at the gym sometimes does not pay off as well as when I just "do it". I burned more chillin' on the treadmill at a mild pace of 3.8 than when I was running for dear life. Apparently holding your chest cause you feel like you're going to die is not a good thing for calorie burn :(
Third: Even tho I made it a point to go to bed 8.5 hours before I had to get up (this thing makes you want to do everything right) I still only slept 5.50 hours. And yes, it is right on with showing when you were just laying down or actually asleep.
Some Neat Features
I found it very helpful that the charts in the Activity Manager gave me suggestions tailored to my day and what it thought my end of day would be.
For example: My second day the calorie burn section had a highlighted part and a shaded part
(The red line in the bottom weight chart is not drawn by me. That is the AM telling me what to expect my weight to be on those dates)
In the above pic you can see where I circled the shaded part for today. If you hover your mouse over that part you get a popup that says you are "X amount" of calories from your burn goal. Then you would see a number in a little box to the left, when you click that it tells you "Hey why don't you try using the treadmill @ 5mph for 40 min and you would burn 'X' amount of calories reaching your goal". It will also give other examples.
It also has this sort of AI in it that knows as time goes on it learns what to expect your day will be like. So, in regards to when it thinks you will fall short of your activity goal (which you set when you first set up the Bodymedia) you can click the little icon and it will give you examples like the picture below. You can even choose if you wanted to see activities in Low, Moderate, or High Intensity situations. Then scroll thru the list to find the activity that suits you best.
It also gives some cool tips nutrition wise. For example, one tip said "You had more than you should for cholesterol intake yesterday. Why not try adding Tofu to your stir-fry next time. Plus, the added fiber and such will help lower your cholesterol as well." Or something to that effect anyway.
You can also expand each category showing you very detailed graphs. You can even select certain time ranges should you want to know how much you burned just while doing yard work, or maybe walking around at a festival.
Above Photo: Calorie Burn Graph
This is the graph for today. Obviously, Monday is my not so hectic day of the week :) The rest of the week I am chasing 6 little ones around in my daycare. You can clearly see the spike in calorie burn when I went to the gym later this evening. If you highlight a certain area it will expand only that time frame, enlarge it, and even break it down to how many calories you were burning per minute as you glide your mouse over it.
Above Photo: Sleep Graph
This is my sleep graph from the prior night. I had a horrible time sleeping. As you can see by all the light grey indicating the time frames I was laying there vs. actually sleeping. I was blown away at just how awesome this thing was when I plugged it in the next morning to sync and see all of that!
You can expand all of the categories. I just didn't picture them all.
Now if you have the LINK version of the Bodymedia then all of your info can be shown to you in real time on your smartphone or phablet. You can then upload it to the website that the Activity Manager is on at Bodymedia.Com via your phones app. This is a new feature since the firmware update. There really isn't any need to tho since you can do it all on your phone. The only thing that does not sync is the sleep. You have to plug it into the computer for that. I will post pics of the phone app when I can, as I find the graphs way more detailed and prefer them over the computer ones.
Well that is it for today. It is late and I need to get my 8 hours in :)
Later this week or weekend I will update on the whole Myfitnesspal app for food logging ( I prefer to use over the built in one the Bodymedia comes with) that also automatically syncs with your Bodymedia.
