There was a time when the pinnacle of training technology was the stopwatch, which would tell athletes whether they were slower or faster than their last session. Times have changed.
Technology is now an integral part of sport for athletes of all abilities, delivering insights that would have required a team of sports scientists only 15 years ago. If you take your training seriously, investing in the right fitness technology can help you achieve things you wouldn’t have thought possible.
An event as daunting as the Fitbit Fifty – a team challenge to run and ride from London to Edinburgh and back in 50 hours – requires intensive training, preparation and planning. It isn’t just a case of conditioning your body, but also believing you can make it to the finish line – and that belief can now be built on hard data.
For example, once you know the distance and target time of an event, you can work out the pace you need to train towards and achieve. Choose the Free Run mode on the Fitbit Surge when you’re heading out on foot, and every mile you’ll be able to see your pace and average heart rate so you can be confident of sustaining the required pace.
With real-time speed, distance and pace data, as well as dynamic heart-rate data, you can make sure you’re riding or running at the optimal pace for your body. By defining heart-rate zones, you can also ensure you’re not pushing too hard so you run out of steam or taking it so easy that you fall behind.
Nutrition and rest are also big parts of preparing for a big event. The accurate measuring of calories burned throughout the day can guide you towards taking on enough to fuel your efforts, while sleep tracking can ensure you’re giving your body the time it needs to recover.
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Wearing a device that tracks your heart rate and accurately measures the calories you’re burning will give you invaluable insight into what your body needs to make sure you’re properly fuelled before and during an event. And when that event involves 50 hours of running and cycling up and down the UK, you really don’t want to be running on empty.
The Fitbit Surge is the perfect partner for serious athletes, covering pretty much every base and delivering copious amounts of data about your performance. By properly analysing and understanding that data, you can improve your efficiency – and with a gruelling endurance event, efficiency is everything.
When it came to efficiency, Fitbit Fifty team member Will Lockwood had all his ducks in a row on the day. He turned in a 103km ride – which included 744m of climbing – in three hours 50 minutes. But the most impressive aspect of Will’s performance during this stage was his average heart rate of 98bpm – in fact, Will’s heart rate peaked at just 159bpm during the stage. Not only does this show that Will is pretty damn fit, but also that he knows how to pace himself – something made all the easier with real-time performance data on your wrist.
Something as tough as the Fitbit Fifty will help you learn a lot about yourself. It will teach you about your physical and mental strength, about the effectiveness of your training, about the wisdom of your game plan and, most importantly, about your weaknesses. As any athlete will tell you, weaknesses are just strengths you haven’t developed yet, and with the right tools you can turn them into strengths before your next big challenge.
The real beauty of having a clear picture of every kilometre travelled, every metre climbed and every beat of your heart is that it helps you tailor your training regime for your next big adventure.
With Fitbit in your corner – or on your wrist – you’ll be able to hone your training and focus on the weaknesses your last event brought to light. Whether that’s improving your pace or working within particular heart-rate zones – or maybe just dropping a few pounds – with all the right data at your disposal, you’ll be able to achieve any goal.
As for the Fitbit Fifty gang, they’ve already got a huge amount to be proud of and to build on, from the 219,556 calories they cumulatively burned to the 24,211 metres they climbed together. The data their Fitbits logged tell a story of passion, determination and heart.
RECOMMENDED: Register For Updates About Next Year’s Fitbit Fifty
