Hey all!  Just a friendly reminder that tomorrow I’ll be hosting my very first LIVE streaming barre class!!  I hope you can join me.  Remember to use the STUDIOFREE code at checkout for a whole free month.  Click here to check out my online studio!  

[bctt tweet=”Live streaming online #barre class Thursday 8/13 at 8AM EST!”]

Apple provided me with use of the Apple Watch.  As always, all opinions are 100% my own.

For today’s Fit Fashion Club we are all about accessories!  Wrist accessories specifically. Apple was kind enough to send me the Apple Watch to try out. I have obviously heard of the Apple Watch and have the app on my phone, but I really had no clue what it was all about. As luck would have it, my heart rate monitor recently stopped functioning so I was excited to see what the Apple Watch could do in terms of fitness capabilities. 

I turned on the watch and right away noticed that it had the functions of a normal watch with the time but it also gives you the temp (love that! Helps me decide whether or not to head outside for a workout). 

When I opened up the watches function using my passcode, I saw that tons of my apps from my iPhone were loaded onto the watch. Sweet!  A WhatsApp from the Hubs appeared on my watch all of a sudden with an unassuming ching! Whoa!  I browsed my email, my calendar for events and my Instagram feed all from the Apple Watch.  My  phone remained in a separate room the entire time. So cool!

Ok, now for the real test.  How can I incorporate this watch into my fit lifestyle?

This is my sport band, a cool pink/coral color!

The Apple Watch comes with a workout app. I opened up, excited to check it out on a walk to the beach with Cooper. I selected outdoor walk from the menu of activities and then selected my goal for the walk. You can choose a goal like time, distance or calories burned for any activity.  After punching in my goal and receiving a 3-2-1 countdown, we were off! 

The Apple Watch started keeping track of our distance, pace, elapsed time, calories burned and, my favorite, heart rate– no chest strap required!  We finished a 2 mile walk in 40 minutes (hey, I was carrying a 17lb baby on my chest!) and I exceed my calorie goal, which the watch was happy to tell me in my final stats.  It also delineated active calories from rest calories, which I thought was pretty cool.

I’ve used the workout app for several other workouts including a step class, teaching barre, tennis. Zumba and TurboFire.  The watch worked great for all of the classes, although the heart rate monitor can get a bit off and need to recalibrate a bit if you are doing a workout like Zumba where there are a lot of intervals requiring your heart rate to change frequently.  I used the “other” function for these activities but there are indoor/outdoor runs and walks available, as well as elliptical, stair stepper and more!

The metal strap is what I like to call “fancy mode.”  I often wear it like this for more low-impact workouts like pilates or just out and about!

One of my favorite features on the Apple Watch is the ability to control the music on your iPhone. I use this function all the time when I’m teaching to change music tracks without having to stop what I’m doing and walk over to the stereo.  I think it would also work quite well when you are running because you can just throw your phone in a run belt, turn on your watch and go.  You can see the song, adjust the volume, pause and skip forward/back just by checking your watch.

Finally, the Apple Watch also functions as an activity tracker. I get little dings on my wrist reminding me to stand up for one minute every hour, complete 30 minutes of exercise a day and move enough to burn a certain number of calories everyday. I can see my progress and how much I complete in a daily basis on my calendar in the app on my iPhone. It also records my steps, distance walked and workouts for the day.  It’s a pretty cool all in one monitor for fitness!

This is a screenshot from my activity app on my iPhone.  I almost made the daily calorie goal but I was really behind on my standing goal (blue) and I absolutely smashed my workout goal (green) of 30 minutes a day!

[bctt tweet=”The @Apple Watch is an all in one fitness tracker, distance recorder and heart rate monitor! #applewatch #fitfashion”]

Readers, have you tried the Apple Watch?  What feature here would you find most useful in your workouts?  

PS Friends, I’m hosting Throwback Thursday tomorrow. Don’t forget! We can chat about our posts during class tomorrow morning!