by Eliana Lakritz MS RD LDN, Clinical Dietitian, Baystate Noble Hospital
Web-based, app-based, and even on-paper fitness and food trackers have become more and more popular. Whether your goal is to gain weight, lose weight, or just become more informed on your nutrition intake, tracking your progress toward personal goals can be very effective. Is it worth it to take the time out of your day to log your fitness and/or food intake daily? Here are a few pros and cons.
Cons:
Tracking your workouts and/or food intake can be somewhat time consuming. You have to ensure that you have easy access to your paper, application or web-based log (whichever you choose) at all times. It is very important to make sure that you enter your meals/snacks and workouts into the log so that you keep yourself accountable as the day progresses, otherwise you’re likely to forget to enter it. Everything counts! For this reason, if you’re a smartphone user and your phone is always with you, app-based trackers can be helpful. With the app, you don’t have to carry a physical notepad around or seek out a computer.
Another con is that you need to be rather good at estimating/measuring your portion sizes, otherwise the nutrition information may be inaccurate. It is also important to choose the correct product or ingredient within the database for the same reason. As far as the fitness trackers, some reviews compared devices and found that heart rate monitor functions were off by about 10 beats per minute. However, many were at least consistent.
For many, logging workouts and/or food becomes more and more tedious. It’s common to be committed to tracking everything at first, but then lose interest or forget after a certain period of time. Try setting alarms or reminders if you feel this is your situation.
Pros:
Many studies have determined that there is a significant association between self-monitoring and weight loss. Food journaling specifically, can help you determine which foods most of your calories come from. It may also give you more insight into some of your food habits, such as whether you are choosing high calorie foods or going overboard on portion sizes. Perhaps you have a habit of mindless eating. Food logging can help keep you accountable for that.
Besides the weight loss benefits, keeping a food log is also helpful in determining the cause of any gastrointestinal (GI) patterns, sleep disturbances, or energy crashes. You can compare your food intake to any possible food-related symptoms you’re concerned about. For health purposes, you can also track how much saturated fat, protein, and fiber you typically eat in a given day. Being mindful of the quality of your diet is always a good thing!
Tracking your workouts or activity level is also great for your health. It is a very easy way to track progress and growth in duration, pace, and difficulty of each workout. Seeing improvements can be very motivating.
Overall, tracking food and exercise is very beneficial to your health. While it may take some time and dedication, you can only benefit from becoming more mindful about your health. Do some research to find which activity and fitness tracker is best for you!
If you are interested in learning more about nutrition counseling sessions with a registered dietitian at Baystate Noble Hospital, please call 413-568-2811 ex: 5671 for more information.
