Nike+iPhone Review
The Nike+ running gadget really works. It isn’t perfect, but it’s better than the other iPhone running applications.
Nike and Apple have made it dead simple: Purchase a tiny $20 dongle to attach to your shoe, so that Nike+ can track your run. That’s it. The iPhone comes with Nike’s software preinstalled; pairing the dongle with your iPhone only takes a moment.
For a long time, I was under the impression that a special Nike shoe was required, but you can use Nike+ with any shoe by picking up a small case for the dongle to tie to your shoelaces. I picked one up for about ten bucks when I bought the dongle.
Better yet, once you attach the dongle to your shoe, you can just leave it there indefinitely. It will conserve battery power and reawaken as needed. When the battery dies, just purchase a new dongle.
After your first run, you can choose to calibrate the device to ensure accuracy. Mine was a little off before initial calibration, but now it tracks distance quite accurately.
The Nike+ iPhone app provides presets for running based on duration, distance, or calories, along with music from a playlist of your choice. You can save presets for frequently-used settings too. Additionally, you can choose a “PowerSong” — a song to play at the press of a button for a quick burst of energy.
While running, the iPhone periodically announces your progress in an attractive female voice (you can choose another voice if you prefer). She’ll say things like “One mile completed”, “You’ve reached the halfway point”, and “500 meters to go”. And you can query your progress any time.
Unfortunately, she’s not very talkative otherwise. I guess I should be grateful that she doesn’t shout “Get a move on!” or “Why are you stopping?” instead.
If you run longer than the duration you selected, Nike+ continues to track your progress as it should. The workout preset just sets a goal for your run.
When you’re done, just sync with iTunes, and Apple will upload your run information to Nike’s website, where you can view stats and track your process. It’s all very seamless. The Nike+ tracking website feels slow and bulky in my browser, but it takes the right approach to tracking: It encourages your activity without any nagging whatsoever. You can sign up for challenges, goals, and the like, or not. If you haven’t run in a while, no big deal — the software doesn’t send you on a guilt trip like Nintendo’s Wii Fit does. I prefer Nike’s method.
The iPhone is a little bulky to carry during a run, and an armband feels sticky in hot weather, but not unbearably so. It’s a lot easier to run with the iPhone in cold weather, where I can stick it outside my sweatshirt or in a pair of gloves. An iPod Nano also works with Nike+, but I only own an iPhone.
As compared to TrailGuru and RunKeeper
As the offspring of Nike and Apple, Nike+ enjoys privileges other applications just can’t match. Nike+ runs as a fully-sanctioned application, giving it the ability to control proprietary hardware and run in the background. You could theoretically browse the web, take photos, and check your e-mail without interrupting Nike+, but you’ll probably run into a tree.
TrailGuru and RunKeeper live outside the gates of the Apple Kingdom, and have less polish as a result. Both TrailGuru and RunKeeper use the iPhone’s GPS to track your runs accurately, and both have decent web interfaces for monitoring your progress. Both allow you to play music during your run. But without the ability to run as background applications, it’s all too easy to accidentally quit them unintentionally and interrupt your run’s progress. I’ve also noticed that Nike+ doesn’t drain the iPhone battery nearly as much as the other applications, but that’s probably because Nike+ doesn’t use GPS.
Gripes
Despite Nike+’s polish, a few things feel out of whack. Double-clicking the iPhone earbud clicker doesn’t move to the next song, as one would expect. Instead, all of those double-click and triple-click gestures cause Nike+ to pause and resume your workout. As far as I know, the only way to change songs during the run is to unlock the phone and tap on the screen with your hands. Normally that wouldn’t be a big deal, but navigating the screen is difficult while jogging.
Similarly, I couldn’t find an easy way to shuffle the playlist you’ve selected. By default, the playlist plays sequentially, which is fine. Unless your playlist contains a bunch of out-of-tune high school band music, in which case you must stop and grudgingly skip past the ugliness.
Eh, maybe I should devote more time to playlist creation.
A beats-per-minute detector would be nice, so that the iPhone could select music based on your running speed.
GPS would be a substantial, simple improvement. While Nike+ tracks distance accurately, it would be nice to see your runs displayed on a map as with TrailGuru and RunKeeper. Then you’d have a detailed log of when, how long, and where you ran. Location is low-hanging fruit; other data isn’t nearly as simple to collect (think heart rate monitors and the like).
The most unintuitive aspect of Nike+ is how it mishandles the iPhone’s earbud clicker; the most cost-effective improvement would be GPS tracking. Other than that, Nike+ performs its function really, really well. Simple setup, great results, and no hassle. You can’t get much more integrated than that. It’s a good example of technology enhancing real-world experience unobtrusively.
If you own an iPod Nano or an iPhone and enjoy running, go get a dongle without hesitation. It’s inexpensive, simple, and fun.