Fitness monitoring -- pedometer, heart rate, etc.

[Gary7]

Do you use an on-person device during your workouts for measuring your health and or progress? A pedometer is the most common thing. I use one made by Casio (the SGW-200) and it works very well, reasonably accurate. I've thought about getting a pedometer with a built-in heart rate monitor, but the choice is a bit confusing as there are so many sour reports on them (I've yet to find one that has mostly positive reviews).

There's also the Apple solution, their built-in pedometer (accelerometer) in the iPod. But the solution using the Nike+ pod only works at refining the accuracy of the steps. On the iPod, it shows a count of steps but not an estimated distance (at least on the 5th generation).

For heart rate monitoring, there is the chest strap design and then the more convenient but generally less accurate wrist sensor design. Has anyone here had experience with any and found a device that works well for you?

 

[RoJoHen]

Never really understood the point of a pedometer. Why do I care how many steps I've taken?

 

[clint g]

I've never really used anything like a pedometer or a heart rate meter. I do use GPS watches on occasion since distance plays a big role in my work out

 

[Yoda]

Right now I don't get nearly enough exercise. I've been using my smartphone to map hikes and walks, which is convenient for figuring out distance, and makes it easy time my workouts, improve times, etc. I never found a pedometer specifically to be useful, but the general idea of quantifying your workouts and measuring improvement is very important for me when I'm exercising. It's nice to have stuff that can easily do that while getting exercise outdoors, rather than just watching numbers on a treadmill.

I would love to grab a heart rate monitor, but I never liked the idea of a chest strap. Maybe it's not as uncomfortable as I imagine.

 

[ManOnTheWave]

I use a Polar heart rate monitor because all of the gyms locally use equipment that that will read a Polar feed. I watch my heart rate and count calories which I then input into an app on my phone so I can see if I'm running at a calorie deficit. (Which is what I want.)