Great Web Tools for Health, Exercise & Activity

In the last few months I have been playing around with a heap of groovy websites that help to visualise, mashup and track health and exercise. The following sites seek to integrate flawlessly with different social media tools to help inspire health behaviour change through a variety of means.

Earndit

This exciting service allows you to earn real prizes and incentives for the exercise and activity that you complete. Simply connect your runkeeper, foursquare, Nike+, Garmin and other services to earn your points. Once you have accrued the required number of points you can redeem your reward from an extensive and ever growing list. The thing I like about this service is the possibility for health behaviour change as a result of extrinsic rewards, which hopefully translate into long term intrinsic rewards as improved health becomes the motivator.

First One There Wins

A cool service that integrates with Runkeeper and Nike+ and allows you setup a race and invite others to race you. You start by giving your race a name, choosing your start and finish points via a Google Map and then inviting others via a unique URL. The race then begins with users logging into runkeeper and completing the virtual race. The web service then tracks all runs that the competitors complete and the first person to complete the designated total is considered the “first one there” and the winner. How about challenging a friend on the other side of the world to a virtual race between two famous landmarks. You will then be able to run in your own town, then login and see exactly where you are in the race on the Google Map. Way Cool. Join me in a race across the Great Ocean Road in Australia

One Health Score

A simple service that turns your recored physical activity (via Runkeeper) into an overall health score. A score over 60 indicates that you are meeting the minimum requirements for general health and wellbeing.  It also shows you how your score has changed over time (see below)

FitBolt

FitBolt is perfect for office workers and students who spend considerable amounts of time sitting at a desk. Simply sign up for an account and the website goes to work to keep you moving at designated intervals prompting you to complete stretches, exercises and even offering nutritional general wellness tips. The best thing I like about this tool is the ability to add it as a browser extension, or desktop app meaning you can get on with working and be automatically alerted when its time to move. Below is an example of the alert system installed into a chrome browser showing me how long until I will be presented with a activity

FIT2app

A simple yet powerful tool that allows you in 3 clicks to upload your run data from your Garmin GPS watch direct to your Runkeeper account. Use this data in a senior PE class to easily visualise physical activity and prompt discussion of concepts like energy systems, acute responses, training and much more.

Run Calendar

A great way to visualise all training and activity that is completed via the Runkeeper system. Connect it to your account and then analyse your training history to see if you are meeting the correct training principles and giving yourself enough rest days.

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