On Friday, I happened across the WiiFit for a reasonable price and decided, what the heck, and brought it home. It's something we'd talked about back and forth and thought it might be fun. Tim has started complaining that he's gained weight since high school and just recently had to go up one whole pant size since high school, so honestly the WiiFit was kind of a joke but not really. (He doesn't get a lot of sympathy. I haven't weighed what I weighed in high school since....a long time ago. Probably since high school, honestly. And while I would love to weigh 113 again, I don't have any delusion that that'll happen in this lifetime.)
So Saturday during nap time, we hooked it up. I went first. It weighs you and then calculates your BMI based on the hugely inaccurate tables that generate BMI based on height and weight. Sadly, they're probably less inaccurate for me than for a lot of folks because I'm not muscle-bound. But I will issue this PSA and just say try not to obsess about BMI based on the tables. If you want an accurate reading of your BMI, go get a pinch test done.
After that, it puts you through a series of balance exercises to see where you keep your center of gravity (meaning do you spread your weight evenly between your two legs or do you put more of your weight to one side. This impacts posture, etc.) Then, based on all of these things, it generates a WiiAge. My WiiAge is 36. Seeing as how I'm 35 in reality, I'm ok with that.
Then it was Tim's turn. When it came time for him to do the balance exercises, he didn't make it through all of them. And the Wii asked him, "Do you find yourself tripping a lot when you walk?" This caused paroxisms of laughter from a certain wife...and it might have been repeated several times for the rest of the weekend. Tim's response? "Yeah, yeah." Anyway, to add insult to injury, it then calculated his WiiAge as 46. Since he's also 35 he was a little annoyed by that.
Later in the evening we decided to try out some of the exercise games. Thinking to take it easy, we started with the balance games. I will just say that while I can stand still and do the evaluation things easily enough, Tim kicked my tail when it came to all the balance games. I thought I was doing pretty well with the soccer headbutting when I hit 75 of the balls. Then comes Tim at something like 175. And the trends just continued in the same vein. I think the only one I did better at was the tightrope walking.
Still, aside from the snarky little comments that the WiiFit Board makes, it's a fun little thing and having played with it again last night, I will say that I'm feeling some of the stretching in muscles I apparently forget to stretch regularly. So there's that.
And now I think I'll trip off for another cup of coffee.
22 hours ago
I find it hard to believe that I'm writing this but I have become the main Wii-Fit enthusiast at our house. We've had ours for about two months now and, as they say in the Bowflex ads on teevee, I'm definitely seeing results.
ReplyDeleteI, too, used to get the question about tripping a lot, to which I replied, "Only when I'm drunk." Nowadays, whenever I get a "You're a little unstable" comment when trying to tie myself into a knot while standing on one foot, my usual response is, "Gee, ya think?"
FWIW, I find the yoga and the strength exercises to be really useful, the aerobics not so much (I went back to my treadmill rather than continuing the running or dancing thingees.) The balance games are fun, although I can't even get ranked on the ski jump anymore because of the family competition. On the other hand, I am the champeen at heading soccer balls!
- Robbo
I have a Wii Fit, and I think it's overall a good thing. That said, you'll probably get a better aerobic workout at a gym. Still, for indoor use, it's not bad. The balance games are really fun, and they keep it entertaining by letting you unlock more things.
ReplyDeleteI have an elliptical that I suspect will be the primary aerobic workout still - but the yoga is fun (and actually I think more useful than the two yoga tapes I have that I have the darndest time following).
ReplyDeleteHonestly I think Tim'll end up doing the Wii Fit more than me simply because it feels like a video game and therefore less like an actual workout.
It's all about the Jedi Mind Trick
I have a wii fit. I'm not going to tell you how old it thought I was - Too embarrassing lol!
ReplyDeleteI too brought it with the hope that I would be tricked into thinking its a video game. I use it more in the winter when I can't get outside as much.