Whether competing in solo sports like swimming or team sports like football, dedicated athletes know that your biggest competitor is always yourself. Winning isn’t about defeating your opponent, it’s about beating your personal best. And maybe one day that beats everybody else’s.
It’s said you can’t manage what you can’t measure, and that’s particularly true for athletic performance. Tracking your fitness data is critical for monitoring your progress and fueling your competitive drive.
Wearable fitness trackers are a popular way to monitor your activity in real time. The problem is they typically only track one or two metrics—steps, heart rate, or calories burned, for example. That may meet weekend warriors’ needs, but it’s inadequate for competitive athletes.
The demands of training for any competitive sport require you to keep tabs on a variety of data so you can gain insight into your performance and make sure it peaks at the right time. At a minimum you should be tracking:
Cardio and strength training workout resultsMeals and nutrition, including calories and macronutrientsBody metrics such as weight, body fat percentage, heart rate, and body measurements
Getting the meaningful, actionable data you need to optimize your athletic performance requires full-featured fitness software. With tools like Athlete’s Database, Runner’s Studio, and SportTracks you can track your workouts and events, nutrition, body metrics, health and medical information, and more. You can analyze hundreds of statistics and generate detailed reports on everything from your macronutrient ratios to your training load.
Keeping track of your fitness data doesn’t just help you perform your best, it can also help identify why you sometimes don’t. Have a subpar workout or come up short in a competition? Your contextual data may indicate you’re overtraining, under eating, or shortchanging your recovery. Like your own personal trainer, these programs help you stay motivated, avert injury, and visualize your progress toward your goals.
Powerful software tools like these require capable computers, such as Intel-powered 2-in-1s, to fulfill their demands. With a 7th Generation Intel® Core™ processor inside, a 2-in-1 like the Lenovo Flex 4 gives you all the power you need to crunch your performance data while combining the full performance of a laptop and the convenience of a tablet in a single slim package. The Flex 4 can also flip and fold into four convenient positions, making it easier to bring the device with you to the gym, track, or wherever else you train, and enter data as you go.
You can’t raise the bar if you don’t know where the bar is. Tracking your fitness stats is crucial for making consistent gains, avoiding plateaus, and pushing yourself to better your best. With the right laptop and fitness software as your workout partners, you’ll be sure to stay at the top of your game.