New Year’s is a time for resolutions, and many of those pledges have to do with weight loss and health. Several websites, including About.com’s Caloriecount.com, will help with the resolution. Caloriecount.com is a calorie counter database where you log all the food you consume to total your daily intake of calories. To create an incentive the website will award three gift certificates to Whole Foods valued at $500 each. Continue reading Count Calories and Win $500 at Whole Foods
Last week STACK Media announced a new partnership with ATTACK Athletics to create a new app for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. This app will let you stack and attack through a 12-week program designed for the ultimate workout for basketball players.
The STACK ATTACK Workout was created by Tim Grover, founder of ATTACK Athletics in Chicago, and this one requires no special equipment, but provides 80 instructional videos that take users through two bodyweight workouts each week with step-by-step instructions.
Grover, a former coach for Michael Jordan, developed his cutting edge physiological and nutrition-based performance enhancement program for other NBA players include Dwyane Wade and Kobe Bryant. Now he shares his secrets in this app.
“During my career, I’ve had the privilege to train some of the best athletes in the world,” Grover said. “This app allows me to bring that training knowledge and expertise to all athletes, so they too can improve their performance through smart training and hard work.”
The STACK ATTACK Workout is available now for download for $2.99 from the Apple App Store.
While we normally look at the technology of the skateboards, there has been some interesting innovation with the skateboard ramps. Here are a couple of interesting videos that show how an iPhone app can measure each skaters “air time” and landings from an interactive projection. The top video was for a promotion for the premier of the movie Tron Legacy, while the bottom video shows how cameras were synchronised with skaters and snowboarder movements.
Red Bull Off the planet from ENESS on Vimeo.
The holidays are a time for many things, including seeing family, visiting with friends, eating too much and basically blowing off exercise. That’s probably why come January 2 many people vow to “do it right” and pledge to turn over a new leaf. Maybe one way to start the New Year off right is by better managing your food intake.
One problem say experts is that you can easily shed pounds by reducing intake, but as soon as you go back to old habits – which die hard and quickly – you’re likely to regain the weight. Additionally, people who reportedly lose weight more slowly while increasing the exercise tend to keep the pounds off.
Brian Young realized this, and he’s worked to develop an app that helps you track and burn, hence the Tracknburn app for the iPod and iPhone. It incorporates the BMI formula that “is accurate as it gets,” says Young, who further notes that one of the most popular ways to determine how many calories are needed to sustain the same body weight is to use the body mass index (BMI) and current activity level. Subtract 250 calories a day to lose 1/2 pound per week.
Sounds simple, but Young notes that this formula also changes as you lose weight, making it hard to track over time. The Tracknburn essentially picks up on this, and does the weight loss math for you. This app takes a users individual profile, along with weight goal and helps make responsible choices. It can be used a food log with more than 140,000 common foods to choose from, and by tracking what you can eat, you can more easily lose at the same time. Now that sounds like a winning solution.
Currently, we are seeing workout attire that breathes better, doesn’t retain that foul gym smell and even helps provide extra “squeeze” to compress muscles. That’s all good and clever, but truly “smart” clothing is now being developed that could change the way we work out.
Reebok and start-up MC10 have partnered up to develop apparel that would utilize stretchable silicon electronics. Reebok would utilize the flexible electronics from MC10 into its sportswear, resulting in clothing that can actually monitor a user’s health and performance during training and post-workout cool down. Continue reading Smart Workout Apparel in Development
The board is on the pad, or more accurately TransWorld SNOWboarding magazine is now available in app form for the iPad. The current iPad version features the Photo Annual, the yearly issue that wraps up the year in snowboarding. Photo Annual comes jam packed with the best action photos of the year in unreal clarity, depth and more full-screen images than any other issue!
From the iPad readers can practically take to the slopes and enjoy hi-def photography, as the Photo Annual showcases an impressive look back at the sport in 2010. Highlights from the issue include: “The Best Biggest Greatest Trip Ever”, an Alaskan photo feast with boarders Travis Rice, John Jackson and Mark Landvik dropping sheer cliffs and clearing canyon-size gaps; “A Chilean Volcano Venture”, riding a live Andean volcano with DCP, Lucas Debari and Xavier de Le Rue– splitboarding to the extreme; and “The Top Ten Photos of the Year”, which are the best daydream and powder-envy inducing images of the year.
The app is available now for free download, while Photo Annual issue is available for $2.99, from the Apple App Store.
Have an iPad? Now you have a way to watch what you cook and how to cook it. Weight Watchers has launched a new app called the Weight Watchers Kitchen Companion, which will take cooks of all levels through the cooking process. Consider this a “soup to nuts” solution as it helps plan a menu, guides you on shopping for ingredients and offers tips on how to make the dish and serve it up.
The app shows you how to lower PointsPlus values in real time to make your recipes healthier, so you can shed the pounds. Articles are available through the app guiding you to key ingredients and foods, whilst discussing common cooking techniques and what to stay away from the bad stuff. You can see the amount of points per menu, and the app offers solutions how to trim the points, cut the fat and reduce the calories in the process. The app is available for free download, for both Weight Watchers members and nonmembers. Continue reading Weight Watching From the iPad
Here’s an opportunity to get yourself or someone on your list set up for their New Year’s resolution. Zumba Fitness, that Latin Dance Workout, is offering a collection of its workout DVDs plus a pair of Zumba Fitness Toning Sticks. Seven DVDs plus the toning sticks that rattle like maracas can be yours for the price of three payments of $19.95, plus $12.95 in shipping and handling. That’s a total of $72.80.
The Zumba Fitness website is counting down the days until Christmas, and then this deal will likely go away. In the set you’ll get
The seven DVDs give you a variety of workouts to keep you busy and engaged well into the New Year.
Planning a trip around the world, or just need to update your Facebook page while you’re off hiking? Either way the GammaTech D12C rugged notebook will survive the journey. This convertible notebook does the transformer thing, going from a traditional notebook to a tablet in a blink of the eye. It features a 12.1-inch Touch Screen display, along with a Web cam and HD stereo audio.
It is drop and shock resistant and tested to stringent MIL-STD-810G requirements. It further features a unique spill resistant design protects it from accidental spills, utilizing a C-face that helps protect the area around the keyboard, touchpad, speakers and wireless and power switches. When off in the wild the D12C is practically air tight as all input/output ports are fully dust resistant as well. Continue reading Rugged Convertible Notebook for World Travelers
GPS devices do more than give you driving directions. They can be treasure maps. X might not mark the spot, but akin to the old pirate days, you can find markers in your GPS maps that tell you where others have left little goodies and sights for you to venture.
A doctor and a professor agree; the LifeSpan TR1200i folding treadmill is a great product. And by a doctor we mean retailer Treadmill Doctor, which named the product the “Best New Treadmill” in its 2011 fitness equipment review. The TR1200i, which is made by PCE Health and Fitness, was also named “Best Treadmill under $1000” by Fitness Professor Review.
The folding treadmill earned high marks for its quality construction, walking area and value, while Fitness Professor offered that the “all new TR1200i offers the quality consumers are looking for in an affordable package plus LifeSpan’s wonderful Fitness Club software.” Continue reading LifeSpan Praised by Doctor and Professor
If you’re using the Xbox 360 to tone up with Your Shape Fitness Evolved you will now have a couple more options to keep you in the game and possibly get you in better shape. This week the makers of the exercise title have introduced two new workout programs for the Ubisoft published release.
These include the “Toned Body Program,” which is designed to help strengthen muscles and get a firmer body, as well as the “Cardio Boxing Platinum,” a new advanced level of the Cardio-Boxing class.
Both are available individually or in a bundled package for download from Xbox Live, and Ubisoft further noted that in the first half of the upcoming calendar year more than a dozen new add-on programs will be released for Your Shape Fitness Evolved.
This week best-selling author acclaimed celebrity trainer Harley Pasternak, renowned fitness and nutrition specialist, got in the game. He will work with Majesco Entertainment Company in a strategic partnership to develop and produce interactive electronic games based on his 5-Factor Fitness Program. The key to his program is fives, where users can see results in just five weeks through five-ingredient meals, five times a day combined with Harley’s fitness program of five-minute sets.
“Backed by degrees in both nutrition and fitness, Harley is the pre-eminent Hollywood trainer, responsible for some of the best celebrity bodies on stage and screen, including Katy Perry, Megan Fox, Lady Gaga and Rob Pattinson,” said Jesse Sutton, Chief Executive Officer, Majesco Entertainment. “Harley’s appearances on Oprah Winfrey and Rachael Ray have helped drive the growth of his 5-Factor brand and convert millions to his distinctive nutrition and fitness program. His program is the type of holistic approach that translates perfectly into motion-based video games that let players take control of their own health in a fully interactive way.”
“I’m thrilled to be partnering with Majesco to create a ground-breaking fitness game based on the same 5-Factor program I use to train all my clients,” said Pasternak. “I designed the program to get celebrities in top shape as quickly and efficiently as possible. This game will give everyone access to the simple yet effective training techniques I’ve used to achieve phenomenal results for some of the best bodies in Hollywood.”
Gamers can look to take it the fifth level in late 2011 with the official Harley Pasternak 5-Factor Fitness game.