New Fitbit Flex

whwalker0988

I am just setting up my new Fitbit Flex and I am slightly confused how this works. I know it tracks my steps during the day but what about when I go to the gym tonight and do my 30 mins on the Elliptical? Does it track it automatically or do I manually go in and track on MFP that I did my cardio? Also, I use MapMyFitness so when I talk a walk do I turn that on? Or do I just let my Fitbit track everything? Sorry, these may be dumb questions but I am in the dark! Thanks guys

GLH2576

You will probably get several, often conflicting, replies to this post as it does not seem that there is any one "right" way to do this. The Flex is a basically a motion detector - it "detects" when you are moving and counts each move as a step. For example, if you wear it on your wrist and have a job that you sit but move your arm quite a bit you may end up with more "steps" than you would have expected. At the gym, some people take the Flex off while doing the elliptical, riding a stationary bike, doing an aerobics class... and just log those times manually; other folks leave the Flex on and let it do the counting. I don't know that there is a right or wrong way but if you are hitting the elliptical machine pretty hard you'd probably be more accurate to take the reading from the machine than you would from the Flex especially if the Elliptical has an HRM that you are utilizing. When I used MapMyFitness I set it up to sync with the Flex and then had both of them sync with MyFitnessPal. they did a pretty good job at sorting things out. I did think that MMF was overgenerous with its estimate of calories burned during a walk and when I used a HRM the calories were more accurate in my opinion. If you decide to take the Flex off at the gym just remember to put it back on - there seem to be a lot of stories from people who misplaced their Flex or who get irritated with themselves when they forget to put it back on and so did a fair amount of walking with the Flex in the locker or their nightstand.