As soon as the ball drops, and the clock hits 12:01, the resolutions begin. A new year, a new me, right? Wrong!
Trust me, I always have the best intentions when it comes to my health. When I got married last year to Sarah, I was in the best shape of my life. 30 looked good on me, but 31… not so much.
As I get older and my body starts to do, well, new things, I’ve learned that sleep must be a vital part of my routine. I’m not too old where I can’t hang with the best of them past the early hours of the morning, but also not young enough where I can pound an energy drink (shutters) and get 1-2 hours of sleep and still be ok in the morning.
How I’m tracking my sleep habits
I remember the days when I could fall asleep anywhere, anytime, at the drop of a hat. There was very little concern that kept me up at night, apart from wondering what video game I would be playing the following day. Things have changed since I was young. Now, I find myself looking forward to a good night’s sleep, so I will have an early and productive day.
If you’re like me, chances are you wake up sometimes feeling like you didn’t actually sleep at all. You know you did, because there is no way you were in bed for that many hours without being knocked out, but your body just doesn’t feel rested. I’ve always found this fascinating and wanted to try one of those expensive sleep studies to learn more about my sleep habits. Thankfully, there’s the Nokia Steel HR watch, which comes at a more reasonable price tag.
Nokia Health Products
Tracking your daily activities just got easier with the help of Nokia. A brand that was once best known for their cellphones, now has a full suite of Health Products that can help you become the best version of yourself.
The Nokia Steel HR watch at a glance is just that, a watch. However, there’s more to the sleek, minimalistic design than meets the eye. It’s an activity tracker, and a mighty good one at that.
Nokia Steel HR metrics tracked
Here are all the metrics Nokia Steel HR is able to track broken down by category.
Sleep:
- Time it takes to fall asleep
- Duration
- Sleep cycles (light and deep sleep)
- Sleep interruptions
Heart rate:
- Beats per minute
Steps:
- Based on user’s motion
Distance:
- Based on the user’s profile for high precision
Calories:
- Health Mate app widget displays active & metabolic calories, as well as the total caloric expenditure
Running:
- Automatically detected
- In-app daily recap of duration and distance
Swimming:
- Automatically detected
- Duration and calories
As you can see from the sleep metric, the Nokia Steel HR is able to log everything from my duration of sleep to the various cycles I go through in any given night. I’ve put it through a rigorous test and can vouch for its accuracy. One night, I set an alarm at exactly 3am to see if the watch and app would log me waking up, and it did. Even better, I organically woke up around 2:14am and it logged that as well. Pretty neat!
Along with my new Nokia Steel HR watch, I also have their Body+ scale, both of which logs all of my activity on the Nokia Health Mate App. From the app, I’m able to easily track my progress and how I’m keeping up with my Health Goals. There’s also a gamification element, which can make getting healthy fun by competing with your friends.
What I’ve learned
So what did I learn?
It’s pretty eye opening once you see all of the analytics calculated after just a week’s worth of tracking. I’ve learned that I don’t sleep as well as I thought I did. I’m going to take all of the sleep data I’ve collected and continue to try to improve my overall sleep by changing things in my life. Like working out more, bettering my overall diet, and drinking less. I’ll report back when I see improvements!
If you have been looking for an activity tracker, I highly recommend you take a look at the Nokia Steel HR. It comes in two dial sizes, two case and face colors, and has a number of different strap options.
