Discovery Health - Vitality & Team Vitality plus everything else you need to know

[Captain Fastbastard Mayhem]

That is (and, Sir Mayhem, please correct me if I am wrong) what happened last year, when Disco dropped the maximum fitness points to 15,000, making it difficult to get to Gold or keep my platinum without all the tests. They corrected it this year, thereby admitting their error, but could easily have done it half way through the year. Rather like the exact opposite of this debacle.

 

(I don't want an Apple watch, and my irritation is purely the hassle of needing to wear a HR monitor, and connecting my 500 to my laptop (for now, still need to check out a solution posed here for that). My resting HR is 38/9, too, so getting anyway near my 'max heart rate' involves drooling, convulsions and catatonia. Which doesn't make my girlfriend find me attractive. And definitely doesn't make me feel like a smoothie.)

Nope, max fitness points was always 30,000 INCL fitness assessments and BONUS fitness Points. Max Base points was 15,000 and Bonus made the next 15,000.

 

Was always like that. Since before I started at Disco as a consultant back in '08. 

 

Now it's 30,000 EXCL Fitness Assessments, and only the Fitness Assessments have "bonus points" according to the level of fitness you achieve on the test. 

 

What they did do,  however, is reduce the amount of points you could get for a fitness assessment. You used to get 7,500 for just pitching up, and then up to 7,500 bonus points depending on your HR's recovery rate. The year before last (2014) they reduced the points for Fitness Assessments to 2.500 for pitching up, and up to 5,000 bonus points. 

 

What this did is forced you to go for 2 fitness assessments per year, if you did nothing else, instead of just needing to go for one. 

 

Max Fitness points (incl bonus) was always 30,000 though. 

Edited March 19, 2016 by Myles Mayhew

[Arno J Rossouw]

The MTB events seems to be on the scarce side. They do however include a cycling shirt, some discount vouchers and your SAC fees.

[Thor Buttox]

Seems to me people look for excuses rather than solutions... I guess they had it too easy and become too lazy.

 

How do you monitor your training and riding efficiency if you do not wear a hrm, unless you actually dont push yourself and coffee ride everywhere?

 

How do you analyse your ride stats as you cannot get enough info of the edge 500 screen, so you have to connect your 500 to a laptop and upload to GC and then sync with strava if you use it. You must have been connecting the 500 to your laptop previously to get your smoothies as the 500 does not have bluetooth conectivity... so am failing to see your irritation or gripe... apart from the sake of moaning without reason!

 

My resting is 42 and as a 50yo, I have to get to 136 which is difficult as most of my training rides am lucky if average 130. It is only when I race do I get there

 

That is almost impossible for me to do at the moment to reach 136 as I crashed racing at the Argus and broke my collar bone... so can only spin at the gym (wearing a hrm)... yet am managing still to reach my 1200 points each week just from a couple of spin sessions!

 

What is bugging me is that I can no longer swim or run until the collar bone is healed and am already feeling the ebbing of fitness... and yet you are here making excuses for something that is very easy to do and achieve the goals.

 

If you do hot want to wear a hrm or upload your 500 by laptop to reach the goals and freebies... dont complain about Discovery as that is your choice! Yes they are forcing you to do so if you wish to benefit from the rewards program but that is their t&c's. The aim of Discovery is to get people to take more of an interest in their health and even get fitter.

 

And by all accounts the awards program is working... I only have to see the number of people ordering smoothies each day at the kauai at my gym.

I am in error about the max heart rate calc so I humbly withdraw that utterly pointless point and also about last year's fitness calc, (thanks, Myles) although I am now confused as in late Dec I was scrambling around trying to find points for my platinum and had to get for a whole lotta tests to find 15000 points and I had maxed out fitness. Oh well.

 

Regards HR: I used HR for 4-6 hours a day in my youth, and I just hate wearing the chest strap. And I don't want any fancy watch. I measure my performance as a function of average speed and sometimes just purely by feel. If I do stop to take my pulse while doing spinning intervals I know almost to within 5 bpm what my rate is. (And my 80% of max has always been 170 in my head from the years of training - hence my cock up, and the visions of drooling.)

 

I never synced my Garmin previously, just used Strava to link to Disco- hence my irritation at now having to. I rarely actually use my lap top for much these days, so it's just a schlep.

 

Like I said much earlier in the thread, I personally have no problem making points if I need them. I'll just do a race or two. And I have no problem with Disco on the whole. I just find it irritating - call it a pet peeve. I am actually on the other side of the argument to the Apple watch complainers - I just like simple things.

Edited March 19, 2016 by Thor Buttox

[eccc whippet]

 

On lighter note...a smoothie before a movie...not a fan of the peanut butter one.

[shaper]

I am in error about the max heart rate calc so I humbly withdraw that utterly pointless point and also about last year's fitness calc, (thanks, Myles) although I am now confused as in late Dec I was scrambling around trying to find points for my platinum and had to get for a whole lotta tests to find 15000 points and I had maxed out fitness. Oh well.

Regards HR: I used HR for 4-6 hours a day in my youth, and I just hate wearing the chest strap. And I don't want any fancy watch. I measure my performance as a function of average speed and sometimes just purely by feel. If I do stop to take my pulse while doing spinning intervals I know almost to within 5 bpm what my rate is. (And my 80% of max has always been 170 in my head from the years of training - hence my cock up, and the visions of drooling.)

I never synced my Garmin previously, just used Strava to link to Disco- hence my irritation at now having to. I rarely actually use my lap top for much these days, so it's just a schlep.

Like I said much earlier in the thread, I personally have no problem making points if I need them. I'll just do a race or two. And I have no problem with Disco on the whole. I just find it irritating - call it a pet peeve. I am actually on the other side of the argument to the Apple watch complainers - I just like simple things.

Strava will no longer be linked to discovery so you will have to go the garmin route... just plug it in to the laptop and by the time you have surfed the hub and read your first thread, garmin express would have uploaded your workout and sent to GC which links to discovery and strava

 

So no need to have your phone on for strava wasting battery whilst you ride

[eccc whippet]

Points to reach my goal moved up to 700 this morning...last week i had a cracker week...training everyday.

[Veebee]

Points to reach my goal moved up to 700 this morning...last week i had a cracker week...training everyday.

Still very easy to get to that, well for 2 more weeks that is.

 

I've been on 1200 since the start.

[eccc whippet]

Still very easy to get to that, well for 2 more weeks that is.

 

I've been on 1200 since the start.

For the next 2 months...i use a hrm at cadence and load the load data to GC and linked it to my vitality.

 

I am thinking about getting one of those wrist hrm...like a fitbit or the garmin one...they are super light and less chance of breaking the screen...while riding in the sticks...then one day when i can afford a 520 edge...it should also be compatible...i think...need to do more research.

[Veebee]

For the next 2 months...i use a hrm at cadence and load the load data to GC and linked it to my vitality.

 

I am thinking about getting one of those wrist hrm...like a fitbit or the garmin one...they are super light and less chance of breaking the screen...while riding in the sticks...then one day when i can afford a 520 edge...it should also be compatible...i think...need to do more research.

Maybe look at a multi sport watch instead of the bike computer seeing that you also getting into running now.

 

I have my eye on the Garmin vivoactive, there is a new one coming which has wrist based heart rate so maybe wait for that.

[Frosty]

Calling all Apple Watch experts:

 

I told the wife to ditch the Strava app and only use the Apple Watch so we can test out the upcoming points revision.

 

For the first time, ever, the wife had to beg me to go for a tandem ride. I have a 150km ride ahead of me tomorrow, so was a bit reluctant to go for 30km ride late on a Sunday afternoon, with tomorrow on the mind.

 

Back to the problem...

 

Had she used the Strava app, she would have got 600 points for a 91 minute workout (speed only, no HR data) - that's what my points reflected for using the soon to be terminated app.

 

The workout app on the watch showed 3.08km, 4667 steps, 1460 Kj and 23 mins of exercise and no "workout", i.e. cycle workout.

 

The previous tandem ride on 6- Mar was 56 mins, for which the watch showed 56 mins and 19m, but 130 bpm (average). For that ride she got 300 points for a 20-59min vigorous device workout.

 

Fortunately the watch is on my name, so getting the points is what I consider "a walk in the park", but for the wife it's pretty much what the other's have been saying... do a 90min bike ride and the damn watch doesn't record it properly.

 

Is there anything she's missing?

The help on the Vitality app mentions delaying the uploading to the health app directly after a workout to allow the HR data to correctly reflect.

 

Luckily we still have 2 weeks to sort it out.

Edited March 20, 2016 by geraldm24

[bertusras]

I told the wide to ditch the Strava app

 

Haha, now you're in trouble mate!

[Captain Fastbastard Mayhem]

gerald, is the watch tight enough? Something my OH has discovered is that the strap needs to be pretty tight in order to record HR properly. 

['Kaze Pete]

Calling all Apple Watch experts:

 

I told the wife to ditch the Strava app and only use the Apple Watch so we can test out the upcoming points revision.

 

For the first time, ever, the wife had to beg me to go for a tandem ride. I have a 150km ride ahead of me tomorrow, so was a bit reluctant to go for 30km ride late on a Sunday afternoon, with tomorrow on the mind.

 

Back to the problem...

 

Had she used the Strava app, she would have got 600 points for a 91 minute workout (speed only, no HR data) - that's what my points reflected for using the soon to be terminated app.

 

The workout app on the watch showed 3.08km, 4667 steps, 1460 Kj and 23 mins of exercise and no "workout", i.e. cycle workout.

 

The previous tandem ride on 6- Mar was 56 mins, for which the watch showed 56 mins and 19m, but 130 bpm (average). For that ride she got 300 points for a 20-59min vigorous device workout.

 

Fortunately the watch is on my name, so getting the points is what I consider "a walk in the park", but for the wife it's pretty much what the other's have been saying... do a 90min bike ride and the damn watch doesn't record it properly.

 

Is there anything she's missing?

The help on the Vitality app mentions delaying the uploading to the health app directly after a workout to allow the HR data to correctly reflect.

 

Luckily we still have 2 weeks to sort it out.

The watch does jot have a GPS. Was it paired to an iPhone+app to record location/speed?

[Frosty]

gerald, is the watch tight enough? Something my OH has discovered is that the strap needs to be pretty tight in order to record HR properly.

looking at the watch (on her arm) at dinner, I could see it did look a little loose.

 

Thanks, I'll check with her later today.

[Frosty]

The watch does jot have a GPS. Was it paired to an iPhone+app to record location/speed?

No phone used, as the watch alone should record HR, so it should be HR+duration only.

[Bub Marley]

Why not just use the tapiriik thing?