Evernote can revolutionize the way you keep track of your fitness…forever.
Evernote is a rather robust cloud note taking application that makes keeping track of pretty much anything extremely easy.
First, let me start by saying Evernote is great for general fitness record keeping/tracking. If you want any sort of analytics on your nutrition or fitness I still highly recommend applications like The Ultimate WOD Log or Science Behind Sweat.
Personally, I use a combination of a little bit of everything, but I am starting to love evernote!!
Having said that, let’s get down to business here and talk about how absolutely amazing this FREE note taking tool can be for keeping track of your fitness.
Why Evernote?
At one point in time I suggested using blogs for keeping track of your general fitness routine, but I ran into some problems using free blogging platforms; problems Evernote does not have, and even better, they address the problems and go one step further making it 10x better than any blogging platform (I’ll explain in a minute).
The question should really be why not evernote?
I even considered using Springpad and Catch Notes, but even those note taking platforms do not come close to Evernote.
So why Evernote?
- Syncs across ALL devices (and has a desktop application)
- FREE (even when used heavily for workout tracking)
- Evernote Add-ons
- Ability to read your writing!!
- Voice Recordings
- Tags
How to use Evernote for fitness tracking:
Here is everything you need to know about how to use Evernote to dominate your fitness tracking!
Step 1 – Take a picture
I use a whiteboard to write down my workouts for the day, but this works just as well on a piece of paper.
Snap a picture of the workout you have completed/written down and put it in evernote. The Evernote app also has a “Page Camera†option that is supposed to optimize taking pictures of text.
**Important iPhone notes**
If you are using the iPhone (not sure how this works on Droid phones) there is not a way to change your picture size or quality with the stock camera app. This presents a problem because the iPhone 4s and 5 has an 8 megapixel camera and the files are rather large. The free version of Evernote only allows 60MB of free upload space per month. You could only upload about a dozen or so pics with the iPhone before you were over your limit…not good.
The workaround:
- Option 1: Good
Download the Camera+ app. After you get this app you can go into the settings and change the pics to a lower size and quality (which is still more than good enough for our purposes). Next, save the pic to your camera roll then upload it to Evernote.
This option is good, but requires a few extra steps which can be annoying over time.
- Option 2: Best
Download the FastEver Snap app. This app makes things extremely easy! All you have to do after you get the app is take a pic…
You can add a title and tags (talked about below) and it will automatically upload to Evernote. Boom! You’re done, the size and quality should already be at a good setting when you first use the app.
Step 2 – Tag it
Tagging your workouts will help your Evernote training notebook to be more organized and will help you more easily find information as your notebook grows.
Here is a pic of some of my tags – your’s could be completely different, and you can always add or delete later.
Step 3 – Search it
Evernote can read your handwriting!!
This is where Evernote trumps any and all blogging platforms for keeping track of your fitness. Unless you tagged it right (exactly the same) or titled it correctly, a blogging platform has no clue what is in your pictures. Evernote does!!
As long as your write legibly Evernote can pick up just about anything you write. So even if you forget to tag something or if you title it something weird, Evernote can still find it for you.
Step 4: Check out other cool features
- Voice Notes
Evernote also has the ability for you to upload voice notes. So if you wanted to add a quick audio note…something like:
That was the worst workout I have ever done, and if you’re thinking about doing it again…don’t!
Ok, well you can record anything. Maybe a quick coaching note, how you felt as opposed to only what you did. It could be anything and it really comes in handy.
- Notebooks
You can also keep multiple different notebooks within Evernote. So you could break your fitness down by training notebooks; say you were doing a specific workout program or style for a short time period, you could keep an individual notebook for easier reference at a later date.
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I hope this helps in your fitness tracking endeavors!!
Do you have any cool way to track your workouts??
-Jerred