And they aren't likely to attempt to follow an exercise clip in the same room as they're surfing the Net. If you want to do a workout video and you've got 20 minutes, it might take that long just to download it. Once the bandwidth is there, I think online fitness will be huge. About 4.8 million American homes, or 9 percent, had broadband access at the end of 2000, according to Jupiter Media Metrix. Of course, technology has its hand in fitness far beyond virtual gyms.
Gadgets help measure body fat, record heart rates, even keep track of blood pressure rates.
The light, portable receiver collects data, then sends it via a phone line to the Internet, where users can log on and see how many steps they took that day, how many calories they burned and, if they wear a heart monitor strap, what their cardio intensity was at different times during the day. A lot of people who start using it get addicted to it. They want to see how many steps they can do in a day. What we've seen is that the people who become most passionate about it are the ones who've had trouble staying motivated in the past. Using a goal of 10,000 steps per day, most SportBrainiacs begin looking for ways to up their count, doing all the things that experts have recommended for years take the stairs instead of the elevator, park in the farthest-away spaces, walk instead of driving.