How does Wii Fit fit into your workout?

According to nintendoworldreport, Wii Fit ($89.99) ranked highest on the Top Ten U.S. Software Sales (by revenue) list for 2008. This past Christmas Santa would have been lucky to find it in on the shelves. So, what’s the draw? The game makes fitness fun.

 

When you first “play” Wii Fit, the game performs a body test by weighing you, calculating your body mass index and leading you through a series of balance exercises. Depending on your results, it offers suggestions for improvement and then asks you to set a goal.

 

Once you’ve been assessed, you can choose from yoga, aerobics, strength training and balance exercises. As you these exercises more often and improve your score, you can unlock other activities.

 

Each time you use Wii Fit, it welcomes you, offers health/fitness tips and let you know if you are on track toward achieving the goal you set.

 

Balance and posture are key to performing any type of activity, whether it’s strength training or aerobics. The Wii balance board will help you improve your body awareness. Even if you appear to hold the tree pose perfectly, you will probably feel a little wobble as your weight struggles to distribute itself across the sole of your foot on your supporting leg. Yes, the board can detect this slight movement!

 

The biggest selling point for Wii Fit is that it makes fitness fun. With any video game, players want to beat other records (even if it’s their own). They strive for the feeling of accomplishment of discovering everything a game offers (unlocking new activities/levels of difficulty) and beating the game, or, in this case, achieving set goals. Plus, it’s interactive. The trainers give you feedback on screen in the privacy of your own home. 

 

People who turn on Wii Fit expecting “a great workout” could get irritated with the amount of time it takes to move from one exercise to the next. Each activity has a demo (optional), intro, countdown, the physical component, results and ranking—taking away from the total time you are actually working out.

 

In some ways, the Wii equipment is impressive in the way it can detect movement and weight fluctuations. But, obviously, it cannot detect everything. It doesn’t really know if you’re doing pushups or jackknives correctly, and it can’t tell if you’re really running or just shaking the controller rapidly. 

 

Also, the game relies on body mass index (a measure of body fat based on your height and weight). In some cases, this is not a good indicator of a person’s weight status as it is based on numbers and not body composition. For example, a very muscular person could fall into the overweight or obese category when in fact they are not.

 

According to the American Medical Association (AMA), childhood obesity kills more Americans each year than AIDS, cancer and accidents combined. A study by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Stanford University found that young people (8 –18 years) spend approximately 6.5 hours a day on screen time (tv, computer, video games, dvds). There is a link. Anything that gets our kids moving will help.

 

Consider purchasing Wii Fit if you need motivation, would like to learn more about exercise or are looking to build fitness into your family’s lifestyle. But diehards seeking challenging cardiovascular workouts or strength training programs probably won’t be impressed.

 

People often ask about the number of calories you can burn doing Wii Fit. This is hard to calculate as you must consider each activity, level of difficulty, real time spent doing the activity and amount of time/repetitions. The American Council on Exercise is currently conducting a study to determine Wii Fit's fitness potential. Their study on Wii Sports is published on the American Council on Exercise website.