Friday Fun: Activity Tracking

[Andy Gladstone]

Happy Friday Atlassian Community! 

For those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, this is the first weekend of the summer. (Sorry Atlassian's Down Under, but you already had your summer - it's our turn now) As the song goes, School's out for Summer! The kids are home, trips are being planned and in general we are getting more active as the weather clears up and the days heat up.

As an avid cyclist myself, I love the summer months. It means early morning rides with the rays of sun shining through lush trees, afternoon walks and evening strolls with my wife. 

As an avid data nerd, I almost never start a ride, walk, jog or any activity that is not just the normal mobility of the day without turning on an activity tracker. My trackers of choice are a Garmin 520 head unit on my bike and my Apple Watch (a recent birthday gift and major upgrade from my Garmin Vivoactive 3). And all of that data posts to the Apple Health App and Strava (some public, most private - who needs their feed littered with 1.5 mile daily commute 2x day on a CitiBike from the train terminal to my office). And that's where my fun continues, slicing and dicing the data of a one mile walk the same as i would a 100 mile ride on the bike!

So here's where Friday Fun comes in.

• Do you wear an activity tracker?
  • If so, which one?
• Do you post your data publicly or leave it private?
• What activities might you do this weekend that you will track?
• What's the most awesome activity you have ever tracked?

There is a lot of 'data privacy' conversation around the disclosing and use of activity based information. Strava has gotten in trouble - back in 2018 - for publishing data that revealed the location and layout of US Military bases. If you have any thoughts on this, post them in the thread too!

And most of all - have a great weekend!

[Saralie S.]

Although I don't wear an activity tracker, I do take a peak on my progress every once in a while on my iPhone. You bring up an interesting point on data privacy! Besides our habits on the web, our physical daily habits could be exploited as well. Just thinking of people who have a structured, daily routine. hmmm...

[Andy Gladstone]

For that reason Strava allows users to mask their start and end points. No need for everyone to know my home address and what time I am leaving the front door.

[Brittany Wispell]

Great post! So thankful for summer now! 

I've recently moved from Texas where summer was not much of an activity friendly state due to the heat. I am now in Colorado and we have not been able to sit still, hiking, biking, overlanding, camping, kayaking etc.

This weekend we plan on doing a few hikes. Hikes I will usually track in the All Trails app. It is mostly for historical information for later, we liked this hike, we did not like this hike etc. It also allows for us to upload photos of where we were so we can remember what we saw.  Same for Gaia app, we mostly use the Gaia app to track our overlanding trips. It is very similar to All Trails. I tend to keep everything private as much as possible. I don't see the need for companies or others to know my whereabouts. 

I used to track activity on an Apple Watch but it's a gen 2 and is too slow. I won't invest in another activity monitoring tool as they come out with new ones too quickly and they are far too costly. 

The most awesome activity I think I've ever tracked was a soccer tournament I was a part of awhile back where we played 5 games in a weekend. Saturday was 3 games and out of those 3 games my activity showed roughly 70,000 steps which equated to roughly 40 miles I believe. It was cool to see just how much running a soccer player can do in a game. It makes sense why I ate a whole pizza on my own that night. haha

Happy Friday and hope everyone has a great weekend!

-Brittany

[Andy Gladstone]

Great reply @Brittany Wispell! 70K steps is the most I have ever seen. Interesting that you equate that to your pizza consumption. I am an avid indoor cyclist on Zwift too, and they measure your total energy expansion in any particular workout as the number of pizza slices you have burned!

My wife and I love the All Trails app as well and use it to discover and follow hikes and trails that we are not familiar with. It's very underrated. 

[Brittany Wispell]

Nice! Cycling is a lot of work, I hope you're able to eat as much pizza as you could ever want! haha

As a previous collegiate athlete, I always equate running to how much pizza I can consume. haha Quick, easy carb energy. :) 

Playing soccer I did roughly ~12k steps per game as midfielder. When I played center back (defense) it was ~9k steps a game. 

It was a lot of fun to track games. 

[Jimmy Seddon]

Great post @Andy Gladstone!

I don't have an activity tracker.  Though part of me is thinking I should get one, since I would really enjoy slicing a dicing data as well.

My plans this weekend have all been indoor activities (yes I know I should really get outside).  I've been trying to get a few things finished off that I will have due this coming week that I don't think I will get to in the evenings alone.

I think the only time I "tracked" any activity was 3-4 years ago when I was hardcore into Pokemon Go!

Have a great rest of the weekend everyone!

[Andy Gladstone]

Any activity is good - just important to keep moving inside and outside. FWIW I spent the afternoon cleaning out my garage with my 12 year old son, and kept thinking it was hotter than my app told me it was going to be. I was sweating buckets. Then I checked the app and it was still set to Wallace, Nova Scotia! I bet it was a much nicer day there than here. But hey, we now have a clean(er) garage, so I'm glad I was tricked.

[Summer Hogan]

Hi everyone, Happy Thursday since I missed this discussion last week. I wear an Apple Watch and I keep my data private except to share it with Virgin Pulse, which is our corporate wellness program where we can earn up to $500 a year for exercising and doing wellness activities. It is really hard here in Arizona to do any activities outside considering it is still in the 100's when I wake up, but I'll be doing some activities inside instead. The most awesome activity I have ever tracked was a hike to the top of Camelback mountain, which is super hard and strenuous! Since it is close to the weekend again, Have a great 4th of July weekend everyone!

[Andy Gladstone]

@Summer Hogan that's a great incentive program. Your comment reminded me that I used to have my Garmin connected to my health insurance provider, but never added my Apple Watch. There are some benefits for employees that track activity and meet goals in our program as well. 

Camelback Mountain in Pennsylvania? Or is there another one I am not aware of (I am in NY, so very NE centric-minded!)

[Summer Hogan]

@Andy Gladstone yes I love Virgin Pulse! We used to have Vitality, but Virgin Pulse is so much better and it comes with the Virgin mall, which has tons of great products you can buy!

Camelback Mountain in Phoenix, Arizona! Echo Canyon train takes you all the way to the top so you can look down at the valley and see all the mansions! 

https://www.visitphoenix.com/sonoran-desert/parks/camelback-mountain/ 

[Brant Schroeder]

• Do you wear an activity tracker? Sometimes
  • If so, which one? Watch
• Do you post your data publicly or leave it private? Private
• What activities might you do this weekend that you will track? Walking, biking
• What's the most awesome activity you have ever tracked? Multiday hiking trip.  

[Andy Gladstone]

Where was the trip? I’ve always wanted to  do a true hiking/camping trip, but could never work out the timing and logistics for it. 

[Amanda Barber]

Digging deep into the archives for Likes for Trees and chiming in on this!

I wear an activity tracker. I recently switched back to Garmin after years of having a Fitbit. I was hoping Fitbit would step up its game after Google bought them, but sadly that hasn't happened. I've been enjoying the Garmin Coach feature and it's pushed me to sign up for a fall half marathon.

I keep my start and end private for my runs from home and my Strava and Garmin are both private to friends. 

I'd say my marathons are my most favorite activities tracked...although the hundreds of miles of training are the real deal. 😂

[Andy Gladstone]

Already following you on Strava and cheering you on!