My lifestyle is in no way short on exercise, even if tracking workouts wasn’t always part of my experience. I use my bicycle as my primary means of personal transportation, including visiting clients, shopping for food, and doing other errands. Plus, I have a daily stretch routine that I started October 23, 2023, and have done most mornings since.
On Not Wearing a Watch
First, a little history… In early 2005, while working for the D.C. Energy Office, I brought my Mac to the office every day because I could be more productive than on a PC, the de facto option there. At the time, I wore a Timex Expedition digital watch on my wrist.
While sitting at a desk with my hands on my 2004 aluminum PowerBook G4, I started to find my wrists out of balance. I still remember the odd sensation of my watch band interrupting the flow of energy on the right while my left wrist was unencumbered.
Note: I’m right-handed, but because my mom is a lefty and she was my primary parental influence in my early childhood, I habituated to wearing a watch on my right wrist and holding a phone to my right ear — even holding it there with my left hand in order to take notes with my right hand.
Anyway, feeling the alignment issue led me to remove the watch from my wrist and carry it in my pocket for some years. It wasn’t until 2008 that I discovered Silverfoot, a Canadian maker of collar accessories for pets and other items for humans, including a watch holder for my belt. And so, my Timex watches have lived on my belt loop ever since, just behind my front right pocket.
First Apple Watch
Over a decade later, in January 2021, a client offered to gift me her Apple Watch Series 2 that she no longer wanted, because the device failed to satisfy her need of a doorbell monitor. After many years of avoiding jewelry on my wrist, I curiously accepted the opportunity to try out this new technology.
I started tracking exercise as workouts, breaking my sitting habits by standing more throughout the day, and generally burning more calories to satisfy the activity ring goals set on my watch. My dad bought his first Apple Watch the same month so we had yet another item of tech affinity to talk about.
My watch performed somewhat poorly and its battery didn’t last very long, but just one month of wear hooked me and I replaced it with an Apple Watch SE.
Happy Birthday
This Thursday, April 24, 2025, is the 10th birthday of Apple Watch. To celebrate, Apple has marked it as Global Close Your Rings Day, with a number of rewards for users who achieve this goal. There are digital awards available as well as a limited-edition physical pin customers can take home that day from Apple Stores, while supplies last.
On the press release page, Apple advertises some health statistics it has accumulated based on user experiences:
Apple Watch users who frequently close their Activity rings are…
- 73% less likely to experience elevated resting heart rate levels
- 57% less likely to report elevated stress
- 48% less likely to experience poor sleep quality
Today, I’m on my third Apple Watch, a Series 9, and maintain a consistent routine of starting and ending workouts when I go for a walk or bike ride, or do my stretches.
Client Notes
Last week I helped Jadine install Chrome on her old Mac to fill out a restrictive government timesheet PDF. I also enabled Philip and Phyllis to hit the ground running with their new Macs and worked with Nancy to consolidate her documents and cancel Dropbox.
Start Workouts with Siri
In my early days of wearing an Apple Watch, it took me some time to get used to starting workouts when I did them. I experimented with ways to remind myself. I even bought a pack of NFC tags and put one on my bike, thinking it might be easy to tap a tag when starting a bike ride, as I wrote about in Tag Your World.
Unfortunately, NFC tags are not compatible with Apple Watch; only iPhone. And they are one trick ponies, so I’d need two tags for the actions of starting and ending a workout. (Apple added an automation action for the latter sometime after I published my article.) This ended up being a nonstarter for me.
Ultimately, I found it easy to start a workout with Siri. For example, I might raise my wrist and say, “Siri, start a bike ride.” Over the years and versions of watchOS, Siri might reply, “Starting your workout”; “Starting your workout in Workout”; or now just ding. Whatever works.
When I reach my destination, I can say, “Siri, end the workout” and it consistently replies, “Ending your workout.”
Alternatively, if you have reason not to use Siri, you can open the Workout app — press the Digital Crown for the app list/grid or put the app in a complication or widget — and select a workout type to start. When done, swipe the workout statistics to the right and tap the ❌ to end.
Settings for Workouts
When watchOS 10 was released in fall 2023, in addition to introducing a new Apple Watch Experience, I was forced to confirm a workout end before it would comply.
Then, the watchOS 10.2 update added a new setting to toggle the workout end confirmation. I jumped at the chance to disable this behavior that I found terribly inefficient.
There are a number of other Apple Watch settings for workouts worth exploring, including:
- Auto-Pause enables Apple Watch to automatically pause running and outdoor cycling workouts for more precise tracking
- Reminders empower Apple Watch to prompt you to start, resume, or end a workout when the device observes a change in motion that seems like one of these states
- Press to Pause makes it possible to press the side button and Digital Crown together to pause or resume a workout if auto-pause is not available and/or if you prefer not to use Siri
You’ll find all of these in the Workout section of the Watch app on iPhone as well as in Settings on the watch.
More Workout Features
watchOS 10 also added the ability to connect cycling sensors, such as speed, cadence, and power. On Apple Watch, go to Settings > Bluetooth and scroll down to Health Devices. This is where you can add a detected sensor.
Note: Cycling sensors often use disposable button cell batteries, like the popular CR2032. To save resources, you may want to consider their rechargeable counterparts, LIR2032. For example, this 8-pack comes with a charger. Such batteries may have 20% higher voltage and only 20–40% of the capacity, but can be recharged 500 times.
Additionally, while you can create custom workouts with specific time or calorie goals, it’s also possible to do so on demand when starting a workout. Simply tell Siri to start a workout of a particular type and add that it’s for a certain amount of calories or time. While the workout countdown timer is normally green, it turns yellow when you specify a time goal.
Speaking of the countdown timer, do you ever wish to start your workouts immediately? Simply tap the timer to skip it. It’s that simple.
Do you wear an Apple Watch? What inspired you? Do you track workouts, answer phone calls, check the weather forecast, or other activities? What features do you like and what shortcuts have you discovered?
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