• james
• Feb 10,2009
• In: Technology

RunKeeper, one of the most useful iPhone apps ever

One of the biggest reason that iPhones and iPods in general became so popular is because they are the perfect accompaniment for exercise. Just Saturday I overheard a person in the locker room say “Shit, I forget my iPod! How am I supposed to work out?” I’m not sure if Apple pays the gym to play the worst, most untough, unmotivating music ever, or if it just happens that way naturally, but people can’t seem to put one foot in front of the other without a beat to follow.

This is especially true for the road warriors, people who exercise outside, cross country running, jogging, skiing or snowboarding. If you’re going to be motivating yourself as you beat down a path or rough it up a mountain, you’re going to need some solid music. This has lead to a whole slew of exercise peripherals being designed by Apple and other third party developers. First there were all the arm bands, then came Nike+, but now with RunKeeper the game has been taken to a whole other level.

RunKeeper is an iPhone application that uses the GPS functionality to track how far the athlete has ran, biked, walked or hiked. This is effen sick! It will map your routes, count your steps, and track your progress. It can be yours for free with ads, for you can buy the full version at your option.

RunKeeper does use quite a lot of juice, estimating 3 hours of continuous use on a full battery charge, and that’s without factoring in using the iPod functionality. Battery life has always been the iPhone one big area for improvement, but never the less this is once well conceived app. Keep training hard like an Alpha Man should and hopefully by the time you’re ready to run a marathon, they’ll have an iPhone with the battery life to sustain you.

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