Gone are the days of carrying a stopwatch and a notepad for workouts. These days the number one tool is something many people carry with them - an iPhone. For under $5 you can buy several apps that will make tracking your weight loss a breeze. In this article I will cover the apps that I use on a daily basis to track my progress and workouts.

Lose It! (free)

My favorite app by far is called Lose It! which just so happens to be free so there is no excuse for not at least giving it a try. Lose It! is my tool of choice for tracking my calories and my workouts.

Overview of how I use it:

• Track the calorie content of every meal that I eat.
• Track every workout that I have.
• Schedule 4 “motivator” alarms to remind me to eat on a regular basis.
• Track my overall progress towards my weight goal.
• Email me weekly reports
• Share on facebook/twitter your exercises.
• Share with my friends my weight loss progress and see theirs within the app. That last feature is huge. Losing weight is way more interesting when you are doing it with others. Watching daily/weekly progress of others is hugely motivating.

I used to keep a journal of all my workouts and exercises. Then I used to keep a txt document and eventually a google doc of all my progress. Using a simple and free! app to do it is so much easier.

C25k ($2.99)

In high-school I used to run cross country. It was just something I did in between baseball and wrestling seasons to stay in shape. It was fun to meet with friends after school and follow whatever workout the coach decided to use. The best I ever got was around a 19 minute 5 kilometer race (6:30 mile pace).

Those days are long gone.

Today I dread running and am lucky to run a 10 minute mile. This is something that I want to change with the help of a very popular beginning running program called Couch to 5k. It is a 9 week gradual program, where you are free to go at your own pace. The over all goal is to be able to go from never having run - to be able to run 5 kilometers without stopping.

There are a couple of popular apps on the iPhone that help you with this program. I chose one called C25k based on its reviews but any of them will probably do and will run you about $3. What it provides are audio cues for when to warmup, run, walk and cool-down. It is basically a coach in your hand that goes at your own pace. I recently finished my 7th week of the program and am getting to the point where I feel comfortable running for 25 minutes - in a few weeks I hope to be able to run for 45 minutes.

I will cover why I am focusing so much on running with my diet in a future post.

Nike+ (free + cost of sensor)

Nike+ works in conjunction with a sensor that you put on your shoe that measures the distance that you run. It has been around since before the iPhone and I have been using it since the beginning because I am a stat tracking junkie. I use it with C25k to measure my pace and track my runs.

The app itself is free and included with your iPhone or iPod Touch if you have the sensor, which can be picked up in most running stores. It isn’t the most accurate device since it is heavily dependent on having a consistent stride and can be a pain to properly calibrate. But it is still an excellent tool for creating running workouts and tracking your progress.

The real meat is on the Nike+ website that saves all your runs (I have some going back to 2007) that allows you to set personal goals (run 100 miles in a year!) and see cute graphs of your runs.

Long after I have graduated from the C25k program I will still be using Nike+.

100 pushups and 200 situps ($1.99 each)

Another popular set of fitness programs are 100 pushups and 200 sit-ups .

Both workout programs are free to follow. I urge that you visit those sites to get an idea of what is involved but I use these apps to help track my progress and like the C25k program - get audio cues of when to workout or cool-down. I am a huge fan of doing body weight exercises and both of those programs are excellent. Last year I came very close to being able to do 100 pushups in a row and 60 sit-ups in a minute with the aid of those apps.

Combine these programs with a pull-up workout and you will be in amazing shape without the cost of a gym membership.

iFitness ($1.99)

iFitness is one of the top rated fitness related apps on the iPhone at 5 stars and it is one of the best bargains too. I used to get annoyed with how often the developer updated the app with new features. Today it is incredibly polished and useful tool.

What it provides is a way to track workouts - how many sets, how much you should be lifting each set, and what exercises you should be doing during the workout. In the past I have used the StrongLifts workout program to great success and it was easily tracked using iFitness.

It also provides a huge encyclopedia of exercises complete with videos demonstrating proper form. It also has weight tracking and the ability to mail yourself workout logs.

These are the 5 apps I use to motivate myself and track my weight loss progress. Throughout the year I will be discussing extensively how I use them to lose 30 lbs and get a level of fitness that I am proud of.

Do you use your iPhone to achieve your desired results? If so I would love to hear how you do it.

Thanks for reading!

I turned 30 last month.

On September 1st I weighed myself for the first time in weeks and found myself at 190 lbs. At 5’10” that means I have a BMI of 27.3, which by that measure is considered overweight.

I have a medium build so BMI doesn’t mean a whole lot to me, but at the same time I am personally not happy with how my body looks or with my level of fitness. The purpose of this site is to motivate me to achieving the level of fitness that I desire. By publishing my diets and exercises I am holding myself accountable.

My personal challenge then is to lose 30 lbs - or weigh 160 lbs - within the year.

I plan to post weekly status reports on my progress. I also plan to document the methods and diets that I used to achieve the results.

Brussels was actually the last stop on our trip. We managed to find some relatively cheap tickets out of Brussels back to Portland so decided to spend a day here. By the time we got to Brussels though we were exhausted and ended up sleeping all day in our hostel so we didn’t get to explore much. We were fortunate enough though to be about a block away from one of the city’s main attractions - The Grand Place.

The Grand Place - or Grote Markt is a square in the middle of the city. The main attractions are the Town Hall and The Maison du Roi (King’s House). These buildings are considered to be some of the most beautiful in Europe.

Towards the middle of the above picture are a group of Americans embarrassing themselves after one of them drank way more than she could handle. Shortly after this was taken she sprung up, sprinted across the square, then tripped and fell on her face. Police eventually looked in on them and advised that she get up because the bricks get cold at night.

At night the city puts on a little show at the Town Hall with lights and music. The sound of this event was enough to drag me out of bed and encourage me to take some pictures.

Our hostel was actually some where on this street. It didn’t even have a sign. One of the things I am going to miss about Belgium in particular was enjoying a trappist beer. For about one euro you can get a 11.3% ABV Rochefort 10.There was just somethingabout drinking a beer that had first been brewed over 400 years ago.

Thanks for looking. A collection of (most) of the pictures I took on my trip can be found on my flickr.

I unfortunately did not get to explore much of Denmark outside of Copenhagen. I was able to visit a small harbor town located 12 km outside of Copenhagen named Dragor, which despite its simple spelling - is quite hard to pronounce. The most remarkable thing about this town was its many well perserved picturesque historical buildings.

There isn’t a lot to say about the town itself, other than it is small and very cute. The buildings are all very historic Danish with yellow paint, cobblestone streets and the occasional thatched roof.

The town was quite touristy and had two bars near the harbor which each exclusively served one of the two main competing beers in Copenhagen. We dined at the one that served Carlsberg.

Still the town clearly had a lively amount of fisherman, which thanks to their tans, were easily to tell apart from the tourists.

For more pictures from my trip to Copenhagen visit my flickr gallery.

On one our final nights in Copenhagen we decided to finally give in and try out one of the canal tours. At this point there wasn’t any part of the tour that we hadn’t already seen, so this gave me an advantage in terms of what to expect. It also meant I could really relax and enjoy the tour.

The tour began just as the sun began to set, so we had some great lighting, but for the first time since we arrived we also got to experience cool weather here.

The new opera house.

The opera house from another angle.

An old sub-yard turned into an upscale apartment complex.

A view of the Marble Church and the Palace fountain.

According to the guide this is the most photographed tree in Copenhagen as everyone takes a picture of it while trying to get a shot of the church as it comes into view.

Over all the tour was a fantastic way to experience Copenhagen. I hope you enjoyed the pictures, please feel free to visit my flickr for more shots of my trip to Copenhagen!

Castle Rosenborg is located in the center of Copenhagen. It is surrounded by a nice park, called The King’s Garden, that people go to during the day for picnics and to relax.

As far as castles go, it is actually quite small and the real highlight is that the crown jewels reside here.

Chi took us on a tour of this castle to give us a taste of Danish history. I purchased an additional pass that let me take pictures inside.

The castle is filled with tapestries, intricate clocks, detailed ceilings, busts of royalty and paintings galore.

This was actually the King’s toilet and was located quite a bit aways from the throne room.

One of the highlights was when a guy who looked like Peter Griffen got all huffy when I accidentally fell on a chair while trying to frame a shot around him.

The guy in this tapestry seemed to contrast with the rest of the imagery.

After throne room we headed down to the real gem of the tour - the royal treasure vault.

Thanks for viewing and reading! A full collection of the pictures I took here can be found on my flickr!

A collection of panoramas that I have taken around Copenhagen.

Yesterday as I was returning home from work I saw a familiar face locking up a bike outside my apartment. It turned out to be a friend of Seyoung’s who lives here in Copenhagen - Chyi Chyi!.

After meeting with Seyoung for the first time in person, Chyi then proceeded to treat us both to dinner and a long tour of East Copenhagen otherwise known as Frederiksstaden.

The tour began with a walk through some yellow housing known as Nyboder.

My first view of the Marble Church:

For dinner we were treated to traditional Danish food at Restaurant Vita which was in a building over 300 years old. I had the fried pork with parsley sauce.

After dinner Chyi took us through downtown to the opera house:

We then walked past a canal where tons of people were enjoying a Jazz festival.

As the sun began to set we approached the Royal Danish PlayHouse:

The tour then headed towards the AmalienborgPalace” where the Danish royal family lives. Before that we past by some gardens and a fountain.

After the fountain we got our first glimpse of the palace square:

After the palace we made our way to St Alban’s Church

Next to it was the Gefion Fountain

Eventually we got to the spotwhere there is usually a statue of the Little Mermaid that was made famous by Hans Christian Andersen. The statue is currently on display in China, so instead we were treated to a big screen in the water.

The tour ended with a walk through the The Genetically Modified Paradise which included variations of the little mermaid statue.

Copenhagen is a compact and beautiful city and it was a pleasure to have such a fantastic tour of this part of it. Thanks again Chyi! For more of the pictures I have taken during my stay in Copenhagen - feel free to visit my Copenhagen set on flickr.