Trends & Features

Smart advances in the fitness tech sector show no signs of slowing

Gone are the days of tracking workouts in your notebook or manually calculating your BMI. The new era of health and fitness is filled with technologicallyadvanced fitness tools, such as fitness trackers, and now Bluetooth-enabled exercise machines that integrate with tools like Apple HealthKit, Google Fit and Microsoft Health to help maximize results and track overall health.

Designed to gather and funnel relevant health and fitness data into one place, or dashboard, these integrated tools are the centre of a digital revolution that sees the growing trend towards connectedness and fitness tracking resulting in the evolution of health and fitness equipment and products.

Smart Products

Bowflex selecttech 560 dumbbells

Rather than adding a lot of bells and whistles to our products, we have learned to stay in-tune with our customers and their needs. A prime example of this is our newlylaunched Bowflex SelectTech 560 dumbbells, which couple classic strength training with new-age innovation. These first ever smart dumbbells count reps, calories and more, syncing user workout data with the accompanying app.

The 560 dumbbells have revolutionized the strength category. An integrated and proprietary 3DT electronic sensor is built in to records reps and weight lifted. It acts like a personal trainer to guide users through every exercise, providing an audible cue when users complete each rep properly.

The 3DT app features a full library of video exercises and allows users to set and track goals, progress, calories burned, share results with friends and more via Bluetooth technology to mobile devices.

A pair of SelectTech 560 dumbbells replaces an entire rack of dumbbells to save space, reducing the number of separate dumbbells from 32 down to only two. Changing the weight is as easy as twisting the handle to adjust the weight incrementally from 5 to 60 pounds or 2.3 to 27.2 kilos to create a customized strength workout.

Surge in Fitness Tech

So, why are we seeing such a surge in companies and app developers jumping on the digital-health bandwagon? Knowledge is power and real-time access to data about overall health and fitness can help consumers monitor their progress and motivate them to reach their health and fitness goals.

Only three years ago, a Flurry Analytics report showed that health and fitness apps were growing at a faster rate than the overall app market with usage (measured in sessions) up 62% in the first six months of 2014 compared to the entire market’s growth of just 33% in that same period—an 87% faster pace. More recently, Technavio’s market research shows no signs of slowing, estimating that the global market for fitness apps will grow at a profound CAGR of around 31% until the end of 2020. A forecast shared by Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) revealed that 37% of the general British public now use some form of fitness, health, and wellness technology.

The Future of Health and Fitness Tech: Modern Movement

At ISPO 2017 in Munich we previewed a new line of balance, agility and core strength products from our new Modern Movement product line, the next generation in balance training products.

This groundbreaking new product line not only strengthens your core, but also gives you the ability to turn your workout into a live gaming experience, measure improvement in balance and agility or utilize a personal trainer with the revolutionary M-Trac app.

The Modern Movement product line includes the new M-Pad Balance Trainer and Edge-Board Extension Trainer.

M-Pad balance trainer

Instead of only moving from front-to-back or side-to-side, the M-Pad balance trainer uses a wider range of motion to better replicate real life movements.

This combination of instability and motion provides a better method for improving balance while actively engaging and strengthening core muscles. The M-Pad Balance Trainer integrates with the M-Trac app, which leverages the sensors in a smartphone to measure balance ability and track improvement.

Edge-board extension trainer

The Edge-Board Extension Trainer is more than just a tool to build rock solid abs, as the user can place either the hands or the feet on the deck to initiate exercises. The Edge-Board features a low deck height for more natural lunge movements and can integrate arcing turns into various movements to engage a broader range of muscles. The rocking deck creates instability, which better engages leg stabilizer muscles. And the braking feature helps beginners to start with shorter movements, gradually increasing the length and difficulty of movement as they gain strength and confidence. The Edge- Board extension trainer integrates with the M-Trac app, which serves as a digital trainer to guide workouts by selecting the difficulty, length of workout, and the parts of the body you want to focus on. It will then guide you through a customized video workout, while tracking your workout history by recording the number of reps and range of motion for reference during future workouts.

Our Modern Movement product line will be available in the UK by the end of 2017 and this innovative line is just the tip of the iceberg in our efforts to add connectivity and turn fitness into fun – with more innovations on the horizon.

We believe that the fitness industry will continue to evolve and advance its adoption of technology meet the ever-changing needs and desires of fitness fans and consumers.

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