“We’ve been working for 18 months on this project and our heart is really in it,” Walter Hermsen, TomTom’s VP for Product Management, told Wareable. “We’re really pushing significant functionality, and we want to take care of those who have bought our products.”
With Fitness Age, a TomTom user is provided with an age based on his or her personal fitness as determined by VO2 max (maximum amount of oxygen an individual can consume per minute for their body weight) with respect to age and gender.
Based off of the fitness level estimate categorized by age, users can earn Fitness Points every time they exercise. Accumulating 100 points per day is the goal for maintaining a healthy lifestyle. Those wanting bigger improvements can shoot for 500 points per day. Every bit counts toward improving the Fitness Age.
“Recent research has proven that the recommended exercise to optimally improve people’s health and fitness is personal and especially determined by their current fitness level,” Urho Kujala, Professor of Sports and Exercise Medicine at the University of Jyväskylä, said in a statement. “TomTom Fitness Age is based on this research, and takes these individuals factors into account. Therefore it is an overall better guide to becoming fitter than just the existing and absolute metrics such as steps, calories and active time and users are more likely to live a healthier and fitter life.”
As for the Personalised Workouts, users will have access to 50 running and cycling workouts through their TomTom Sports watch. The intensity and duration of the workouts offered are adjusted to reflect an individual’s fitness level — determined through the user’s Fitness Age.
Two additional new features include phone notifications and Autopause. Your watch will now received text and call notifications and Autopause will automatically pause your watch when you stop moving, preventing little breaks in activity from distorting user’s performance data.
