Show HN: A better way to track fitness goals (my nights and weekend project) | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: A better way to track fitness goals (my nights and weekend project)

12labs.com

35 pointsdurga40 comments

FitFrnd is a mobile app that helps you enjoy working out.

- Flexible goals: Set an initial fitness goal. Adjust your goal as you make progress and learn about what you enjoy doing.

- Share your success: Tell friends and family about workouts done and milestones achieved! Share on Facebook and Twitter.

- Push your buddies: Encourage friends and comment on their workouts.

- Smarts for fitness: Discover weekly patterns in your workout history, and get better at working out.

- Be a winner: Kick ass and get into shape!

FitFrnd is fun, simple and easy to use. It is your personal fitness companion and social butterfly rolled into one!

Video Overview: http://youtu.be/_i3dWPdDdD4

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I'm so sorry. The music prevented me from getting far enough in the video to understand what this was.

amccloud, not sure what you mean.

I think he meant music in video is too distracting for him.

Change the music, it is for preppy teenage girls that bring back terrible memories for nerds.

Maybe he is targeting preppy teenage girls trying to look better to fit with the "in" crowd and doesn't care about nerds?

I honestly don't know. I'm just saying, don't automatically assume nerds are the end users being targeted.

Done - music removed :)

The silent video without annotations thing is a bit strange, as somebody who has never used fitfrnd I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be looking at. Perhaps a simple Javascript slideshow widget with labels might work better? The pictures on fitfrnd.com are a lot more effective at illustrating the functionality of the app, though admittedly less information-dense than an animation or a video.

Edit: sorry, I just noticed technel made the same point below and saw your reply.

Annotations added. Better now?

6th Grade Slow Dance! YEAH!

It's hard to tell from the screenshots if you track weight or not, but if you do I highly recommend doing a similar weighted-average system as Libra[1]. Not a lot of apps do this and it's pretty critical to tracking actual weight loss over time. It's based on the thoughts in [2].

[1] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.cachapa.li...

[2] http://www.fourmilab.ch/hackdiet/www/hackdiet.html

I've been using v1.0 for 3 weeks now. Very clean, have been able to drag myself for short walks at lunch.. :)

awesome :)

wickedchicken, that's very interesting. We intend to have weight tracking in v1.2 and will take the weighted-average system into account.

For what it's worth, I use Cardio Trainer for tracking + social sharing. Friends "cheer" me on via Facebook, and I can progress my workouts using a myriad of tools they have. It's unclear what this does beyond that.

For what it's worth, if there were an app that helped me know WTF to do when it comes to building muscle tone/size, I'd happily pay for that. To an averagely fit guy (5.5 miles in 60 minutes or so, 2-3 times a week), the weights side of thing is infinitely more complex than the cardio side of things (which amounts to "keep your heart rate within this range for a long time").

I can empathize with you. I run, walk and play racket sports, but for me and a lot of my friends, weights are kinda scary.

Since the dynamics of weightlifting are infinitely more complex(you need to do it right to not hurt yourself, you need to push yourself a certain amount etc), trainers are probably a better option than an algorithm.

One of the ideas we are considering is building a feature in the app that lets you hire an online trainer for say x dollars a month who'd guide you and oversee your progress. It'd obviously be much cheaper than hiring a trainer in the gym by an hour. Would such an option appeal to you?

Durga

I'm a similar type chap (running, biking, squash) but the weight side isn't too complex once you realise that a lot of the books over complicate things for the sake of getting the book published and the magazines regurgitate the same stuff on an annual basis.

Stick to the good old 3 sets of 8 reps 2 - 3 times a week and give each muscle group a 7 day rest. No more than 6 exercises per session (keep it under 1 hour)

If you just want to do one weights session a week stick to dead lifts, chest press, squats, overhead press and pull ups and you'll see improvements. Dan Shipper wrote a decent article on this recently, just keep it simple and build it up slow and don't worry about all the complex sounding regimes.

Where you should take advice is on how to do the movements but that's what the gym attendants are for ... and if you already have a membership then 5 minutes of their time a few times a week comes for free

Some possibilites to address this in the app could be:

- provide videos of workouts that users can look at.

- users can probably take videos of their workouts, post privately to youtube and maybe have an online trainer look at them?

- Have a 15 min webcam session with the trainer where the trainer looks at your technique and provides feedback.

- Have a trainer look at your weekly logs and provide direction.

All these could potentially be done with the app, some experienced trainers, and a small fee. Thoughts?

With respect, you're over simplifying it. Achieving and maintaining good proportions (the usual goal of those starting out) is going to take more than Olympic lifts + pullups. Similarly 3x8 on one muscle group once a week isn't a catch all; it's my opinion that a work out should tailor to your ability and goals.

That's before we even get into diet. Planning exercise without diet (or vice versa) is a recipe for no progress.

>For what it's worth, if there were an app that helped me know WTF to do when it comes to building muscle tone/size

I'm working on an app to tackle this problem right now; I've just started development though.

If you get the time I'd love to hear what features you'd like to see in an app like this. You can respond here or my email is in my profile :-)

I guess this app so far cover the need for average folks like me who needs motivation to keep average health! For the kind of limited consumers who wants to build muscles, it has to be purely paid model as the market size is limited.

Does the video only showcase features that are new to 1.1? Presumably most people going to your website already do not have the app, right?

Also, I'd love to see something a little more visual (I skipped the video because I was listening to music) like static screenshots, icons for the features, and a larger call to action at the bottom (at first glance I couldn't find where you actually talked about how to get the app).

technel, good point. You could mute the youtube video, but I get your point. Will add screenshots and a CTA at the top right away..

This is one app that is aimed at simplicity/ease of use and at same time maintain the flavor of social driven motivation. My wife and I have been using it for quite some-time. We often go out to do something motivated by seeing others doing something. I really like the simplicity of this app without losing the purpose.

I have seen this evolve since Durga released an early beta to friends and family.

The evolution has been fantastic with better app design as he got more users and feedback.

I still keep telling him to hire a designer to make it look prettier, but he is nailing the functionality first! :)

hey durga, I like the simplicity but for me it isn't useful. There are many other apps that do a similar thing.

I want an app with workouts I can share with friends, so we can try to do the same workouts remotely.

A friend of mine wanted to start strength training for rock climbing. First finding an app that creates a progressive workout is non-existant. (and if it did exist, it probably sucks) Second, there isn't an app that you can share scheduled workouts with another user and keep each other accountable.

ssx,

We have been thinking of doing something very similar. For me the motivation was to make a feature so that my dad can do his evening walks with his friends who are remote, at the same scheduled time. I'll push this feature up in the list.

Durga

Cool. What I wonder is what are the main differences between this and Endomondo? From my understanding it does the same things basically?

aik,

pls see my answer to mlerner's question below..

Very nice! Good UI and colors. Now here's the big question - did you come out weight-negative while developing this app?

zscraper,

I've lost 2 inches of waistline. I haven't lost a lot of weight (3 pounds) so I'm assuming (hoping) the fat loss was compensated by muscle build?

Workouts: short walks with dad, and evening tennis matches with friends.

Durga

A follow up on what hitting the front page of HN did to your app downloads is due soon.

Is this very different from what Strava [1] is doing?

[1] www.strava.com

mlerner,

Thanks for your question.

Our focus is on making workouts fun and non-intimidating. It's not for the hardcore workout guy who runs 3-5 times every week and needs no motivation. It's for the large number of busy professionals, moms and dads, older folks, who'd like an app that gently helps them keep fit, feel less guilty, and re-ramp up again once they have taken a break.

The differences are: - Helping users ease into a goal rather than try something ambitious and get discouraged. The goal "Adjust" feature is emphasized so that users feel it's OK to change their goal as often as they like. Also goals are weekly, since that's how we usually think about workouts. Eg: "I went for runs 3 times the past week, and did 3.1, 2.7 and 3.2 miles". - Focus on encouragement, rather than competition. The aim is virtually create the experience of working out with your close friends. - Setting micro goals and achieving them. A 20 min walk around the office block at lunch is useful exercise.

Its pretty awesome that a product manager wrote code and made shit happen.

xxcode, thanks; that's the best complement I could get. Coding for your own project is amazing fun :)

That indeed is amazing. In a typical app development project vision, product and engineering is owned by different people. Sometimes, vision and product is done by a single person. Rarely, I have came across projects, where a visionary, thinker and creator is a same person. Outcome of such a project must be absolutely fantastic.

Thanks. That's flattering, though maybe not as rare. The guys at Instagram designed and built the app. Googlers did it? :)

and both have billion dollars associated with them. That was the point.. if planner n doer is the same person.. often the result is an amazing product..

yeah it's sweet when the 16 hour days start paying off big :). But doing design and coding both is a lot of fun - though I wouldn't mind having some help a good visual designer..

It's often the product managers who actually make the product straight!! Often developers don't look at the consumability perspective of the product. Rest programming is common sense anyone with enough common sense do.

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