Author Topic: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!  (Read 2655 times)

WhitstableDave

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #30 on: 18:14:18, 03/04/20 »

I assume that they can also be operated with no incline as well?
You're in complete control of the incline (and speed). By default, the incline and speed constantly adjust to match the activity. If you manually alter the incline or speed you'll follow the activity just the same but with your preferred settings.
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WhitstableDave

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #31 on: 18:39:02, 05/04/20 »
My first five days of treadmill walking...  :)



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WhitstableDave

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #32 on: 17:32:06, 06/04/20 »
A few posts back, I reported on my virtual walk up Mount Kilimanjaro.

I didn't have the patience to start at the bottom, so I met my guide Jake at about 15,000ft and walked to the 19,300ft summit with him over three stages. Today we stood at the highest point in Africa!  :)

This activity is called Crater Camp Interval Hike, where the 'interval' refers to speeding up at regular intervals. On an incline trainer, this would have been pretty tough because the slope would have been exaggerated to simulate the extreme altitude. On the treadmill though it was a bit less challenging than my last North Downs Way walk because we were going much slower.  ;)

My attempts at photographing the screen while walking...

We set off from Crater Camp at sunrise:



It's a funny thing... but when I saw a crowd of people at the summit, I felt the same disappointment as I do on our mountains in real life!  :(



Okay, it was just a simulation, but I still thoroughly enjoyed the experience - and the views were absolutely spectacular!
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Bigfoot_Mike

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #33 on: 19:19:28, 06/04/20 »
It looks like you have had some interesting indoor hikes Dave. This is tempting me to consider a treadmill. I had a cheap one years ago and that didn’t work very well. I quite like the look of the incline treadmills, but it looks like they could get quite tough.

WhitstableDave

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #34 on: 22:15:31, 06/04/20 »
It looks like you have had some interesting indoor hikes Dave. This is tempting me to consider a treadmill. I had a cheap one years ago and that didn’t work very well. I quite like the look of the incline treadmills, but it looks like they could get quite tough.

I'm loving the treadmill and would highly recommend getting one Mike.

The problem is that when I look now at the NordicTrack website (from where we bought ours), most models are out of stock - including ours which if it was available would cost £500 more than we paid a couple of weeks ago!

(Should have bought shares in a fitness machine company!)
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Mel

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #35 on: 17:03:08, 07/04/20 »
Well done on summiting Kilimajaro WD  :D

WhitstableDave

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #36 on: 18:23:49, 07/04/20 »
Well done on summiting Kilimajaro WD  :D

Thanks Mel. I've been taking it easy today with a second Hawaii walk and a stroll along the Caledonian Canal. The latter was in the company of the actor Graham McTavish (The Hobbit, Outlander) and as we walked he talked to me(!) about the Battle of Culloden. I'm learning stuff!  :)
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WhitstableDave

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #37 on: 18:43:05, 08/04/20 »
Yesterday evening, I was looking at the map wondering where to walk today. I've been doing variations on local walks in the same two areas for what seems like a very long time, and I had to be honest with myself: I really didn't want to do the same routes again and have the hassle of avoiding people to boot.

So I came to a decision. I'd focus almost entirely on treadmill adventures for the foreseeable future and perhaps go on outdoor walks when or if the weather keeps everyone else indoors.

Today I did a lot of virtual hills!  :)

I began by walking the final 3 miles along footpaths to Machu Picchu followed by 2 miles wandering around the citadel seeing it all. This was an enhanced Google Street View walk which meant I didn't have a companion and I could set my own pace. The track in the fourth image in the collage shows the extent of the sightseeing wander...



Next I decided to climb Ben Nevis. I'd already done a couple of video activities with Graham McTavish (Hobbit actor) and I decided to join him on his walk up the mountain. He talked a lot about kilts (he was wearing one) and various battles, which passed the time quite well, but he said nothing about our route. The video activity ended somewhere on the mountainside with views of what I worked out must be Lochan Meall an t-Suidhe. So, wanting to reach the summit (which I've not done), I used Google Street View to follow the obvious path to the top. Adding the ascents from the two walks gave roughly the correct total so I'm happy to claim that I've climbed Ben Nevis... virtually!

I must admit that I was surprised by how straightforward the climb appears to be, although I'm sure many other routes would be harder. The path was occasionally rocky but mostly gravelly, stepped or like crazy paving, and I didn't see any tricky bits at all. 



Having done two walks today where the slopes were almost endlessly upward, I decided to do a short (2 mile) downhill hike through a spectacular canyon on an Hawaiian island with my friend Heather. Actually, our treadmill doesn't descend, but level was fine!  :)



Tomorrow, I plan to do the first stage of the Pennine Way...
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WhitstableDave

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #38 on: 18:49:38, 12/04/20 »
I've settled into a routine, at least for a while, in which I do a fairly strenuous walk along a national trail in the morning and a more relaxed and shorter walk later in the day.

The national trail walk uses Street View so it's a bit like a slideshow in which the images change every 2 or 3 seconds as I walk. For my other walk, I really enjoy what I think of as educational sightseeing, where the walk is accompanied by a video with a guide or trainer talking about the activity.

I've finished the series set on Hawaii and I've done more Scottish walks, the most recent being a stroll around the gardens of Dunvegan Castle on Skye. Today, I started what looks like a fantastic series - basically walking to the bottom of the Grand Canyon followed by walking back to the top over 15 episodes.



This has to be one of the most amazing places in the world to walk.  O0
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April

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #39 on: 20:14:00, 12/04/20 »
It does look great Dave. I wondered how the street view thing worked, I am more tempted now to get one myself but crikey it is a lot of money for one like yours.
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Mel

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #40 on: 21:20:16, 12/04/20 »
....Actually, our treadmill doesn't descend, ...


Are there any that do?  Gap in the market perhaps?  I know when I used to use our gym at work if I wanted a "descent" I'd put it on incline and turn round.... took a bit of getting used to mindst  :-X

WhitstableDave

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #41 on: 22:16:29, 12/04/20 »

Are there any that do?  Gap in the market perhaps?  I know when I used to use our gym at work if I wanted a "descent" I'd put it on incline and turn round.... took a bit of getting used to mindst  :-X

Hi Mel. Yes, some treadmills do have descent. I'm new to this myself of course, but while we were browsing we came across some high-end ones that have descents down to around 3-5%. I've also seen incline trainers with a range of -6% to +40%. 
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gunwharfman

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #42 on: 17:24:36, 13/04/20 »
Are your walks and runs just streamed or downloaded from YouTube, or are they specific to the treadmill company or yourself?

WhitstableDave

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #43 on: 18:06:58, 13/04/20 »
Are your walks and runs just streamed or downloaded from YouTube, or are they specific to the treadmill company or yourself?

I'll do my best to answer...  :)

The treadmill has a built in touchscreen and it connects to the home network via wi-fi. Both the treadmill and our devices, such as my PC, connect online to the iFit system. iFit is available for many treadmills and it came installed on ours.

I use it in two ways:

For my 'Street View' walks like the Pembrokeshire Coast Path, I use iFit on my PC to plot the route by clicking along the trail with the mouse just as I'd plot a route on the OS Maps website. A snap-to-route facility makes this quite quick to do. When I go to the treadmill, my route is already there and I'm ready to go. As I walk, I'm given Street View images which are updated every two or three seconds and that creates a good simulation of walking the actual trail. The treadmill rises and falls to simulate the trail's varying ascents (it levels off for descents), using data from Google Maps. I set my own speed (aiming for a 4mph average over the whole walk).

The video walks work differently. I choose the walk I want to do from the iFit library on my PC. Many of the walks are part of a series, for example, I just did the first of three parts of an ascent of Beinn Alligin. On the treadmill, the video plays and I'm taken on the walk by a trainer or a guide depending on the type of activity I've chosen. They talk as we walk. Ascent and speed are set by the video - so on the Alligin walk for example, the ascent was mostly at 12% (the maximum) and the speed was typically 2.5mph,but it varied according to how fast the guide was walking at the time.

Whichever method I use, the treadmill saves all of the data about the activity and when I go to my PC my statistics have been updated. The system is seamless.

There are other ways to use iFit and the treadmill, but that's how I use it. Street View walks are unique because I plot them and choose my walking speed, but the simulation is basically a very good slideshow with thousands of slides. The video activities are extremely realistic - it's like watching a TV while walking, with the speed and slope matching what you see and it feels as if the person is actually talking to you.
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gunwharfman

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Re: Treadmills: A world of walking without leaving home!
« Reply #44 on: 20:42:43, 13/04/20 »
Thank you, really interesting as well. Well beyond my knowledge I'm afraid, I'll just have to stick to my Ipad virtual runs. I did one run yesterday of 30 mins and one today of 20 mins both were along Hadrians Wall, I've found in the last few days that I can now run for 30 minutes at 8mph, I've already outgrown the 4mph button and when I finished yesterday I was STEAMING with perspiration! I find that once I've passed the 5-minute barrier I can just go on and on, I just get into a rhythm, even my wife is impressed. There's a great moment on one of the Hadrian Wall runs where the runner with the camera gets to a trig point and just clings to it panting, his camera picks up his effort so well, all I can see is his arms gripping the concrete top but that's more than enough to get a feel of what he's going through. I'm learning that some are good virtual runs, in that I can see the path clearly ahead but some are very poor, especially when the runner decides to run along a beach, so boring! The one I dislike the most is the one where its called a 'run' but the person(s) who is holding the camera has filmed it from a car! Thanks again for your information.

 

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