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There are many fitness tracking apps around to monitor your runs, rides, and other workouts. Over the past few years, several of them have been acquired by athletic apparel and footwear manufacturers, which usually made them part of their overall fitness offering. For instance, Under Amour integrated Map My Fitness and Edomondo into its portfolio, and Asics did the same with Runkeeper. Adidas also went shopping back in 2015, when it bought Runtastic. Two years later, the company shut down its miCoach ecosystem, prompting users to migrate to the newly acquired service. The German brand now pushed the integration further, as it officially renamed Runtastic to Adidas Running.
Every now and then, Runtastic throws a bone to active and sporty people by discounting its Pro apps to zero. That's zilch. No pennies, no dimes, no dollars. It's happened with Sit Ups Pro, Pedometer Pro, Road Bike Pro, and now is the time for Mountain Bike Pro.
When I think of Runtastic, I think of an app that I install on every phone fully intending to use it. Unfortunately, I completely forget about it and end up uninstalling it when I go through a regular purge of my drawer. What I don't think of is cooking food (at least in regards to the app itself), but here we are with Runtastic's latest: Runtasty.
Adidas bought Runtastic in August of 2015 for more than $200 Millions, and since then, we haven't seen a lot of signs of that acquisition. But that changes now with the news that Adidas will be shutting down its own sports platform and apps, miCoach, and focusing instead on Runtastic.
While I enjoy working out, I will admit that going without my favorite music makes it much more difficult — especially with cardio. For me, good music equals gains. Equally important, though, is keeping track of progress, but that can often require switching between two or three apps. That is, unless you go old-school and carry a notebook.
Exercise apps are a really good target for the Chromecast. If you're trying to follow the exact steps of a workout and you don't know the body position and movements, you don't want to check your small phone's screen and keep fiddling with its angle and trying to turn it on each time the display timeout kicks off, while also struggling to maintain a Crab Bridge. Instead, you'd much rather it was streamed to your big TV and you could follow along and see it no matter what weird angle your head is at.
You want to become a rock hard slab of skin and muscle. I hear you, and I understand. Here's a pro-tip, you have a great fitness trainer already floating around in your pocket. Look at it. That flat, hard sheet of glass. That chiseled frame. Your phone is in great physical shape, and it knows just what to do to help you get there.
Adidas, the company that made your pair of gym shoes and track pants, has purchased Runtastic. It reportedly paid around 9 million to close the deal.
Be honest with yourself: the only reason you log into Runtastic with a Facebook account is so that you can show everyone else how much exercise you're doing. Now you can show off in a more direct way with Leaderboards. This is basically a mobile version of the leaderboard feature that was recently introduced on Runtastic's web service, which tracks total miles or kilometers covered by you and your Facebook, Google+, or Runtastic contacts who use the app.
There's no nice way to say this: May kind of sucked for new apps. There were a lot of notable updates to major existing apps (including a slew of Material Design updates), but the biggest news of the month came from Microsoft, of all places. Oh well - a short field just means it's that much easier to pick your bets. Here in no particular order are our top picks for the month of May, and a few runners up.
Runtastic knows that you'll be sitting on your ass for hours during Google I/O, watching the conference and gorging on all the news, so it decided to release a new app to... taunt you? Or motivate you to get back in shape once I/O is over? Whatever the purpose, Leg Workout Trainer is now available on the Play Store.
I'm not much of a runner, but I've occasionally made use of the Runtastic Running and Fitness app to keep track of my time and distance while jogging around the neighborhood. Given that it's the middle of winter in the US, I won't be firing up the app anytime soon. But the more dedicated among you may be happy to know that the latest update (version 5.4) has made the few visual adjustments needed to better fit in on Lollipop devices.
Runtastic has all sorts of apps (many of which have absolutely nothing to do with running) – everything from cycling, to heart rate monitoring, to abs, and so much more. Its newest app, however, really wants to help users get their ass in shape... literally. It's called Butt Trainer, and well, the name speaks for itself. (For the record, I suggested "RuntASStic," but they didn't go for it.)
After both Runtastic and RunKeeper got updated with Google Fit integration in the past couple of weeks, it's Nike+' turn today. As one of Fit's initial launch partners, this update was expected and should come as a surprise to no one. All you have to do is launch the app once it's updated and follow the prompts to give it access to post its data to your Google Fit account. If you don't want to enable this feature, you can simply dismiss the prompt or later disable it under the app's settings.
Runtastic Launches Sleep Better, A Sleep Tracking App That Has Absolutely Nothing To Do With Running
If you're like most adults, then you probably don't get enough sleep. With the constant state of gogogo on everyone's mind these days, we're all so busy that it takes time from nature's way of replenishing the body, which is why it's so important to get quality sleep when we do lay down at night. Runtastic has a new app that aims to help users keep track of their sleeping patterns, appropriately called Sleep Better.
My love for Runtastic grows by the day. Not only is the service very useful to track my runs and hikes, but its Android app is almost always on the forefront of the latest Google and Android features and guidelines. Case in point: it was one of the first fitness apps to add support for Android Wear and it just got updated with Google Fit integration.
There's no shortage of ways to track your data while working out, especially when it comes to things like running and cycling. There's Runkeeper, Map My Ride/Run, Endomondo, Strava, and many others. Which one you choose really comes down to personal preference, but each has its own set of benefits and features that may make it a better fit into your life. Personally, I've been using Runtastic since I reviewed the Orbit a couple of months ago, and settled in with the company's dedicated road cycling app after getting the Runtastic-branded Speed & Cadence Sensor and Heart Rate Monitor. Both devices pair with the phone over Bluetooth and sync automatically with the Runtastic Road Biking app, so after the initial setup it's all easy-peasy.
I've been using Runkeeper to track my cycling activity for the last eight months or so, and it has never really let me down. That said, I'm always on the lookout for new (or improved) ways to monitor my rides outside of my bike's cyclometer, so when Runtastic reached out to me about taking its new fitness tracking band Orbit for a spin, I was down for the challenge. I've had it for the last few weeks, and so far I think it's a good start. It's a new product so there are a few quirks here and there, but for the most part it does what Runtastic designed it to do: track stuff. What stuff, you ask? This stuff:
There are lots of fitness bands to choose from: the Jawbone UP, Fitbit Flex, Nike Fuelband...and many others. If you're a Runtastic user, however, there's a new one on the market that may interest you, the Runtastic Orbit. As you may have already guessed, this one is built from the ground up for use with Runtastic's services – running, cycling, etc. It doesn't yet work with the company's dedicated cycling apps (road biking, mountain biking), but support for those is currently in the works.