When I left BNP Paribas, my wonderful colleagues bought me an IPOD Nano. This is something I never would have bought for myself, so it was perfect. I love it and run with it all the time.
This week, I tried out the new Nike+ Ipod sensor this week. This cool little gadget tracks your runs and allows you to listen to music at the same time.
A couple of months ago, Apple and Nike teamed up to produce the Nike+ running music system. This includes the IPOD Nano (which is perfect for running since it uses flash memory instead of a hard drive), a special receiver which attaches to the base of the Ipod and a small sensor which sits in the sole of a special Nike+ shoe.
The sensor in the shoe is picked up by the receiver in the Ipod and tracks your distance, calories burned, current speed, etc. By touching the centre button of the Ipod while running, you get a male of female voice give you a status report (ie. “Twenty-three minutes. Distance: 2.43 miles. Current Speed: 7:13 minutes per mile.” When you sync up your Ipod with iTunes at the end of your run, your workout details are uploaded to a secure page on the Nike website which tracks your running history, speed, etc. You can also, they say, challenge someone else to a distance race on the other side of the world.
This technology has been around for about a month or so. The sensor kit itself only costs about £20, which is not too steep if you already have the Nano. The real cost is the special Nike+ shoe that is “required” to use the kit. This little gadget ensures you are stuck with Ipod and Nike for the rest of your life.
However, after doing some web research, I found articles detailing how 
to use the sensor with Non-Nike+ shoes. It involves putting some Velcro on the tongue of your shoe and the the sensor and placing it under your laces. I’ve done that to my Nike (but non-Nike+) shoes. It worked great. The distance reported was very accurate and I found it alarming how slow my running speed was at times. For the base sensor kit, I got all the bells and whistles without the expensive shoes.
If you’ve found this post because you want to know if the velcro method of attaching the sensor works or not, I can attest that it does. It works very well. Now, I’m listening to music or audio books and keeping track of my miles accumulated.
I highly recommend the Nike+ Ipod sensor (but not the shoes).
You can buy the sensor from Apple Store. http://store.apple.com
Great post! Used this, it was great, and the hints are useful 🙂