My Omron Pedometer aka 10k a day or bust

Or as my 5 year old would say, "Mom, don't forget your dometer";) It started two years ago. No wait, we should go back even further before I had my usb omron pedometer. I was 5'8 and approximately 230 lbs. I had one of those wake up calls after the end of my marriage and I knew I had to start losing weight. Walking to lose weight seemed the logical choice.

My first pedometer was not an omron pedometer but a cheap one I found at a yard sale. It looked like one of the free promotional ones that people use. The kind that just breathing registered steps or you shake the crap out of it and it registered 300 steps. My first impression of pedometers was poor. I continued to walk. The weight started to drop but I really wanted motivation. I bought an mp3 player. Ok that helped a bit, but I like numbers;) I decided to do some research about pedometers and that's how I discovered omron pedometers. They use an accelerometer.

Huh, an accell... what's an accelerometer?

Accelerometers are used in many applications such as in cars to activate smart braking or to detect the deployment of airbags to laptops where it can protect itself from a sudden freefall by turning the hard drive off. In the omron pedometer application, accelerometers sense the walking movement as opposed to the vibration of walking allowing it to differentiate between a jolt and an actual step so the omron pedometer registers far fewer false readings without reducing sensitivity.

What's the point of that?

It means it's very accurate, 99%.

Other pedometers use a traditional mechanical pendulum that has a suspended lever arm that uses either a coil spring or a thin hairspring. Any motion can trigger it resulting in an inaccurate step count. Hairsprings lose strength quickly and the lever arm droops, causing inaccuracy after just a few months of walking. The USB omron pedometer avoids this problem with advanced accelerometer technology.

The other advantage with that is that it means you can wear your USB omron pedometer in your pocket, on a clip on your belt, around your neck, and yes, even tucked into your bra ladies.

Ok, enough of the fancy science stuff, what does it do?

So I learned all this two years ago. At the time the the Omron pedometer HJ-112 was the best in the market. But I was so excited when they released the Omron pedometer HJ-720IT as it is USB and connects to the computer so you can track your steps online. The USB omron pedometer is manufactured by Omron for WalkingSpree.com, also known as the Omron Walking Style HJ-720IT. It has a USB cord to connect to my online profile on WalkingSpree.com. It tracks all my steps, aerobic steps, fat burned, distance walked and calories burned and sends it to my online wellness profile. If I'm unable to connect to the computer at the moment, it displays 7 days of activity and retains 41 days in its memory (so like when I took my kids camping for 5 days, no worries!). It has an event function key that can memorize special activities by the hour.

Hey, I said enough of the jargon, what kind of fun stuff can you do with a USB omron pedometer?

Now the good stuff. Because I can upload my omron pedometer walking data to the walkingspree.com website, I'm able to participate in walking clubs. I can see everyone's step data and see how I'm ranked in the club for the day and for my all time in the club. I hate to say it, but some people walk A LOT. I'm ranked 8th in Moms on the move walking club. One time I managed to walk 16,000 steps in a day, yes that's right 16,000 freakin' steps. And yes, I ranked 1st for that day. And since we're all using the same pedometer, everyone is on the same playing field. One of the problems with manual logging like with the HJ-112 is that people have ego's and yes, they cheat. Not to mention, who has time to do that?


Woah, that sounds like a lot, how far is that?

10,000 steps is approximately 5 miles. So I walked almost 10 miles that day.
Darn, I need to get out there and walk more or I'm not going to reach my target for today. That will be the next post, setting goals and targets with your omron pedometer that connects to the computer.