Tech Tools for Healthy Living

In our last post, Blake mentioned a few fitness apps we use to help keep ourselves on track. In fact, the whole idea of using technology to help achieve fitness goals has been quite the hot topic recently, so we thought we would share some more info on the apps or other tools we’ve used or read about.

• Map My Tracks OutFront or MapMyRun-These apps are fairly similar and we use them on our iPhones simply as a GPS to map new walking or running routes. They keep track of distance, calories and pace which we can only assume are fairly accurate, but for us, the general numbers are good enough. You can also connect them to Facebook and Twitter if that will help hold you accountable. Personally, I think those people are annoying.

• Nike Training Club-Holy crap, this app will kick your ass. It has a lot of great workouts that range from 15 to 45 minutes all sorted by category. On those mornings where I would give anything to skip my run, sometimes a 15 or 30 minute workout in my pjs is the perfect compromise and almost always leaves me sore. The best part is—most of the workouts don’t require any equipment at all.

• My Fitness Pal-Blake and a lot of our friends use this one to track their diets and exercise. It’s basically a food journal that tracks calories and other nutrition information. The people I know who use it say it helps them think about their eating habits. The best part is that the app only makes the POSITIVE public. No showing the world you went over your calorie goal, but they do get to see that you kicked booty in the kick boxing class. I, however, don’t think I am mentally stable enough to see every calorie I eat.

• Pandora or Songza-I personally don’t listen to music when I work out, mainly because I run on the street and it isdangerousand I would rather listen to the ocean anyway. However, if you are one of those people that like music to help get you going, or live in a cold weather climate, a music app is must-have. Nobody wants to pay and download every song they listen to so online listening apps are essential. I’m a big Pandora fan and even pay to not have ads. Songza is also pretty cool in that the app gives you music stations based on an activity or mood you select – a great way to discover that 80’s hair bands can boost your cardio output!

• Fooducate-Neither of us have tried this one, but after seeing it on TV (possibly on Today? Can’t remember) and reading about it, I am intrigued. The app allows you to scan the barcode on a food product and it will then pull up the nutrition information and offer healthier alternatives.

These are just a tiny sampling of the tools out there to help you meet your fitness goals and maybe make the journey more enjoyable. Are there any others you would like to recommend? Also, for you San Diego readers—if you ever want to go for a run or hike, hit us up 🙂

Color Run Fun!

Starting line

The San Diego Color Run took place last Saturday and I’m still finding tinges of blue and green in my ears. Both Nicole and I participated for the first time in this fun event, but on different teams. Nicole and her team, Hell on Heels, ran early at 8:30 a.m., while  I ran with team Colorly Love during the 1:30 p.m. race.

So, as incredibly fun and hilarious as this event turned out to be, we learned a few tips and tricks we will be employing during next year’s run.

Race Packets

GET SOMEONE TO GO PICK THESE UP PRIOR TO RACE DAY! The lines were edging on 2 hours long and you don’t have time for that on the day of the event! To be nice you should probably send a group, and possibly a little flask of Shiraz or something of the sort (I mean, not that we’d ever do anything of the sort, that’s only a joke, I mean we don’t even drink). However, remember that the sucker (ahem, BEST GROUP MEMBER) that goes to pick up the packets must have a signed document saying they’re allowed to pick up race packets for someone who is not present. We did hear whispers of people forging signatures and text messages being accepted in place of documents – not sure if this would work in every city since we here in the beach cities are pretty laid back 😉

Face Masks

If you’re sensitive to breathing in dust or other types of particles, I would recommend running with a mask. Your pre-race packet will also recommend that, but since our team was primarily worried about looking “cute”, we didn’t pay attention to this part. Along with having multi-colored Kleenex for a few days, breathing in the dry powder may hinder your fun on the day of the event – remember with ANY slight breeze and this stuff billows into huge clouds that you cannot get away from. To ensure that your team still has a cute “uniform” you can use some of these ideas we saw floating around:

• Painter’s Masks: These folks really stood out, plus since these masks are meant to be worn for a while I assume they weren’t as hot as some other options.
• Bandannas: This option looked cool (a very robber-esc look) but I’m not sure it worked in the long run since it seemed that the colors were attracted to moisture – which I assume would accumulate with the breathing.

Eye Wear

Before and After

Same issue as above, the billowing power can get into your eyes and cause irritation. Plus, some of those color sprayers don’t quite adhere to keeping it below the neck (I will let some of it slide because they were little kids and their aim may not be quite up to par). Our teams both just wore glasses (both sunglasses and clear lenses), but we also saw some people wearing goggles, both the swimming type and science lab type!

Team Uniform

Obviously if you’re running this race, you and your team must determine an outfit strategy. However, remember that EVERYONE will be

Team Hell on Heels

wearing white, TONS of people will have on the event T-shirt, and there will be rainbow-colored tutus in masses. Many people opted to keep their cellphones safe from the color, so if your team is separated, it was almost impossible to find each other. Find SOMETHING that will stand out… whether it be little horns like Nicole’s team or matching headdresses.

Tutus

At the post-race event dance party there is a special dance set aside for those wearing tutus. If you want to shake your stuff while everyone looks on be sure to be wearing one!

Becoming Color–fied

Team Colorly Love

We were slightly disappointed that we weren’t more color-ific at the end of the race. If you just run the race and dance around in the color packets they give you, you will NOT be as intensely colored as all those pictures on the event website – you need to strategically color yourself. We found that the damp spots made the color stick to your clothes better, whether it be sweat or the cups of water we dumped on ourselves. Also, try and position yourself to be colored with the “pretty” colors. Yellow and orange give you a weird dirty look while the pretty pink is soon covered up as it is the first color-station of the race (at least for our’s). When you pick up your race packets and your 1 free
color-pack make sure you get the pretty colors: purple, pink, blue – the rest soon turn you into a brown mess. When you’re throwing your color-packs ensure you have DIRECT contact with a team member, I’m talking a handful of color literally smacked on there and rubbed in for maximum color saturation.

We also saw evidence of people bringing in their own color (we’re talking empty Ziploc baggie proof)!!! Team Colorly Love decided that our next go-around we’ll be smuggling in our own colors, and making sure they’re the pretty colors (no ugly yellow or orange!). I found a website with a recipe to make the colored powder. I haven’t tried it yet but feel free make some and leave us a comment on how it worked!

What do you Think?

Any other tips we missed? Could we have had an amazing inside experience and missed it? Let us know in the comment section so our next 5k or next Color Run is EPIC!

(We’d also like to give photo credit to team Colorly Love’s photos to Little Miss MBA and her “good-sport-bearded-photographer-boy friend”)