The most beautiful, brilliant, and thoughtful woman in the world happens to be my best friend.  She also happens to give very good birthday gifts, like the Nike Fuelband she gave me last month for my 31st.  So I decided to take on the challenge – meet a goal of 2500 fuelpoints each day of December.  This seemed pretty easy, considering 2500 is an average goal for women my age and I have a fairly active job.

So what is a Fuelband?  The Nike Fuelband is a motivational tool to inspire activity.  It uses an accelerometer to track movement, and converts it, based on your height and weight, into a fitness currency called FuelPoints.  It also tracks approximate steps and calories burned and displays the time!

For my challenge, I decided to go with the goal Nike recommended – 2500 points per day. The first couple of days were easy peazy.  Forty-five minutes on the treadmill earns about 1800 points.  An eight hour workday is 700-1500 points depending on the busyness.  Walking casually around town earns about 250 points every half hour.  House cleaning is about the same.  Unfortunately, activity that doesn’t involve quick arm movements, like the Pilates class I took only earned 200 points in an hour.

Week 1 – 18,387 total FuelPoints. 57% Goals Hit. 8,772 Steps per Day.  Best Day of the Week – 3,935 FuelPoints on Thursday.

Then, on Tuesday of Week 2, my Fuelband broke.  The additional piece that customizes the fit of the Band broke off and I couldn’t find it.  It took me a couple days to get it into the Nike Store for repair.  Once I brought it in, they hooked me up with a new piece and I was ready to go – again.

Week 2 – 14,088 total FuelPoints. 29% Goals Hit.  6,694 Steps per Day. Best Day of the Week – 3,728 FuelPoints on Thursday.

Mondays are usually days spent completely in an office with little work activity.  If I don’t go to the gym afterwards, it results in a day like Week 3 Monday – 1,209 FuelPoints.  Then, I forgot to put it on Thursday morning before I left the house for the day.

Week 3 – 18,147 total FuelPoints. 71% Goals Hit. 8,988 Steps per Day.  Best Day of the Week – 4,308 FuelPoints on Tuesday.

Then I started to get a cold.  The last week of December in retail is pretty brutal and I was done.  Then, on December 29th, I got an error message to plug it into a computer and sync.  Who uses a computer anymore?

Week 4 – 8,688 total FuelPoints. 0% Goals Hit. 3,117 Steps per Day.  Best Day of the Week – 2,077 FuelPoints on Friday.

Breakdown for December
61,150 FuelPoints
35% of Goals Hit
6,380 Steps Per Day
463 Calories Burned Per Day
2,264 Average FuelPoints per day

So here’s the bottom line.  The FuelBand is is a great motivational tool, and that’s exactly it.  You shouldn’t expect it to track all your activity accurately.  You can get more points clapping at a seated concert than you would riding a bike across town.  Some friends have trouble syncing and can’t retrieve the previous days activity.  It’s got some problems.  Some bugs.  Some kinks.  There are definitely ways to improve.  But when the words at the bottom of the NikeFuel app say “1800 points behind vs Women 30-39,” it’s pretty motivating.  How the heck are these old ass women beating me?  I’ll show them!