Nike has announced the Nike+ Fuelband which gives iPhone users in-depth information on their daily physical activity. With development assistance from the likes of Lance Armstrong, Kevin Durant and Carmelita Jeter, the Nike+ Fuelband is able to keep track of your daily physical goals using a built-in accelerometer. The user sets a daily goal in the morning, and Fuelband tracks time, steps, burned calories and more.

One aspect I like about Fuelband is the ability to gain points from more activity based on a social metric after syncing with your iPhone.

The Nike+ Fuelband will be available for $150 and pre-orders are now being taken online, however Nike hasn’t disclosed an official release date.

Source: Nike+ Fuelband

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Returning to your regularly scheduled ZENandTECH, Georgia and Rene discuss the benefits of exercise and how it alleviates depression, burns away stress, helps you sleep, improves your concentration, and otherwise works wonders. Plus, some app picks to help you keep track of your progress and build good habits.

Read on for more, including our Nintendo Wii giveaway!

Topics

• The importance of aerobic exercise
• The benefits of aerobic exercise: Rapid metabolism of adrenaline and thyroxin, oxygenation of blood and brain, stimulates endorphins, decreases cholesterol, improves circulation, lowers insomnia, increases self esteem, improves concentration and memory
• How to know if you’re not getting enough: Are your muscles tense? Can’t walk up a set of stairs without being out of breathe? Long recovery time after you exert yourself? Feel tired? Lethargic? Feeling depressed? Ache for days after a work out?
• Examples of aerobic exercise: Cycling, running, swimming (great if you have injuries), combat sports like grappling, vigorous sex
• Help getting motivated: Join a gym, join a team, ask a friend to start with you

Tools

• Think about how well you take care of your gadgets, how you keep them clean, protect the screens, keep them charged and updated.
• Now think about how well you take care of your most important gadget — your body. You deserve the same level of care! More even!

Homework

• Get your heart rate up for 10 min., 5 times a week (to burn stress)
• Start slow if you’re new, better to aim small and accomplish

Giveaway

to coincide with ZENandTECH 4: Exercism, we’re giving away a barely used, mint-condition Nintendo Wii (we review a lot of stuff we never have a chance to use later). One lucky listener will get to work out, and have fun, with Wii Sports and a bunch of other active, exciting games.

All you have to do to enter is head on over to iTunes and give ZENandTECH a review. (We’d love 5 stars, but that’s not a requirement!)

Because iTunes doesn’t provide contact info, once you’ve posted your review, just shoot us an email at podcast@zenandtech.tv and let us know which one is yours. We won’t make your email public, but we will use it to contact you if you win!

And hey, if you already have a Wii, enter anyway. You can give it to a loved on or friend, a child or grandparent, anyone who would benefit from staying healthy and having fun!

That’s it! Go enter!

Tech pics

• BlackBerry: GymTechnik
• webOS: Jogstats
• iPhone: Top 5 iPhone Fitness apps
• Android: Android fitness app picks

Sponsor

This episode of ZENandTECH is brought to you by the PreCentral.net Store, your one stop shop for everything Pre, Veer, and soon… TouchPad. Combine a TouchStone with a Palm Car Charger for the ultimate in on-the-go power. You spent a lot of money on your device, protect it, keep it charged, and keep yourself happy!

Hosts

• @GeorgiaTiPb (Georgia)
• @reneritchie (Rene)

Contact

You can reach all of us @ZENandTECH, via email at podcast@zenandtech.tv, or leave a comment below!

Thanks everyone, you’re the best community on the web and we love having you with us!

Please subscribe on iTunes and leave a rating, it means a lot to us!

Disclaimer

While Georgia is a therapist, she’s not YOUR therapist. Everything said or implied on this show is for informational and entertainment purposes only. And shouldn’t be taken in any way as a replacement for proper, professional care.

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We were scheduled to talk about exercise on ZENandTECH this week, but after suffering a death in the family, Georgia discusses the stresses and strains of major loss, and offers some tools and tips for dealing with them, including… video games. Then it’s back on topic and we somehow end up on whether or not sex counts as exercise. (Listen to find out!)

Read on for more!

Topics

• Dealing with death
• The importance of exercise

Tools

• Breathing
• Work that occupies your mind but doesn’t stress you, like casual video games, cleaning, knitting, etc.

Homework

• Get your heart rate up for 20 min., 4 times a week (to burn stress)
• Start slow if you’re new, better to aim small and accomplish

Tech pics

• The Holmes-Rahe life stress inventory

Zen pics

• A nice hot cup of tea, or beverage of your choice. Take care of yourself.

Sponsor

This episode of ZENandTECH is brought to you by the WPCentral Store, your one stop shop for everything Windows Phone. Check out the awesome new accessories for Samsung, HTC, an dmore. You spent a lot of money on your device, protect it, keep it charged, and keep yourself happy!

Hosts

• @GeorgiaTiPb (Georgia)
• @reneritchie (Rene)

Contact

You can reach all of us @ZENandTECH, via email at podcast@zenandtech.tv, or leave a comment below!

Thanks everyone, you’re the best community on the web and we love having you with us!

Please subscribe on iTunes and leave a rating, it means a lot to us!

Disclaimer

While Georgia is a therapist, she’s not YOUR therapist. Everything said or implied on this show is for informational and entertainment purposes only. And shouldn’t be taken in any way as a replacement for proper, professional care.

Some of us recently realized there’s a whole world out there, and perhaps it’d be a good idea to visit it once in a while, and an even better idea to (gulp) exercise in it.

And so, we hug out for a few minutes at CTIA 2010 with the folks from Trimble Outdoors and their AllSport GPS app, which comes in a free, ad-supported version [iTunes Store link] and a full, $4.99 version that adds a few additional features [App Store link]. It’s kind of your standard GPS trip app, but it’s for athletes and out-of-shape bloggers of any age. Pick your activity, hit the start button, and it tracks your route, time — hell, altitude, if you’re flying — and logs it all online for posterity and/or sharing on Facebook and the like.

Check out video of it in action after the break.

YouTube link

The iTunes App Store is faring well and apps are flying off the virtual shelf, but lest we forget, web apps used to be the only game in town for anything 3rd party on the iPhone (unless you jailbroke your iPhone – you rapscallion you). There is a plethora of web apps that iPhone owners use day-in and day-out. The internet is a big place, but fortunately people like Kelly Sonora are happy to share tips like www.NursingDegree.net, where writer Christina Laun has posted “iFit: 50 Coolest Fitness and Health Apps for the iPhone.”

There are numerous apps listed, including categories like fitness Tracking, Calculators, Diet and Nutrition, Working Out, Relaxation and Inspiration, Medication and Diagnosis, and Miscellaneous Health. Some links may be broken, but for the most part, Christina Laun has compiled an impressive treasure trove of fitness web apps that are designed for access from the iPhone.

Check out web apps like MyNetDiary and FitReach for keeping track of your workouts, diet, and manage your weight goals. BMI Calculator and Daily Calorie Calculator can be used for approximating your Body Mass Index and the number of calories you should be ingesting each day. Food Information Database and iPhone Diet are apps you can use on your iPhone to get nutritional information from your favorite restaurants and manage your diet and monitor your nutritional intake.

With Pump10, you have access to view numerous workout videos on your iPhone; view workout videos while you are at the gym. FitSync is a good way to keep track of your workouts online and select workout programs. These are all just a few of the 50 apps listed; visit the site from your iPhone and try them out for a more healthy you!

That’s it for this week’s Tip.  Thanks again to Kelly Sonora for the lead and Christina Laun of www.NursingDegree.net for the article. If you have a tip of your own that you would like to share with the rest of us, please leave a Comment or you can email me at: brian.hart@tipb.com.

Disclaimer:  Tip o’ the Week makes no guarantee, express or implied, that any tip found herein will be new or particularly useful to the reader (and working your iPhone’s accelerometer in one hand and eating a Twinkie in the other do NOT “cancel each other out”).