Anyone else put off by tough competition? (or know others who are?)

[benspaul]

Is anyone else put off by the competitive nature of Fitbit, or know people who are?

When I've done fitness competitions with my family (using an online spreadsheet), the less-fit family members could never win competitions despite their best efforts, and thus were left with negative emotions and it hurt their motivation.

So I was surprised when buying a Fitbit that the entire basis of interacting with friends is competitive (friendly and supportive competition, but still). I'd suspect that we'd encounter the same problem, that less-fit people are put off by this instead of motivated by it.

Does anyone else experience this problem or have friends or family who do?

If there are enough others who feel the same way, I will think up some potential solutions and propose them to Fitbit. For example, I've had success when we changed our family spreadsheet to monitor not who's winning but who is on track to achieve their own personal fitness goal for the month.

Thanks!

Ben

[Julia_G]

Hi, @benspaul , I find I mostly compete with myself (against my Fitbit enemy!), but I agree, the best way of competing is where you can level the playing field a bit... If Fitbit could develop a handicap system, like in golf, that would be amazing! I hope you do find some suggestions or solutions!

[PearldP]

Hello Benspaul,

I am just new to Fitbit community - about a week or so, but I already noticed how competitive it could get and insane at the same time. By just looking around at different communities, I have seen how people go crazy in outdoing each other. Competition is healthy but taking it to extreme level just to lead the pack will surely take a toll on those who cannot equally compete- we hold different jobs and some are more physically active than others. That was my first impression and so I decided not to be sucked into it, because I am very competitive as well and I would probably want to be number most of the time. Hence, I have set my daily personal goal agaist bigger fitness goals I have set beforehand (e.g. marathons with new PR). This way, you are competing with your fiercest competitor- yourself, without killing other people's motivation. However, I am the only one in my family whose doing FitBit. But, we all support each other in our fitness goals by giving gentle nudge or firm push whenever necessary to achieve our goals and hold each other accountable. 

I think your idea is good- a tracking system that would monitor each persons progress according to their goal rather than a competition that eventually kills motivation. On the same token, I would still not discredit healthy competition.

Thanks

Pearl

[Cygnuswomyn]

I think put off is the wrong term, I just recognize where I am in my fitness and it will be a quite a while before I am physically able to be competative w/ most people.  My fitbit is like my little personal trainer/cheerleader.  So far, I am really seeing it as an ally.

It would be great to have groups that celebrate setting and maintaining personal goals together. So carry on Ben and let's see what ideas you have.

Cheers,

Stacy

[AmazonDallas]

I have to agree its a little hard for desk sitters to compete with people that work on their feet.

I have not joined challenges because I know I can't compete but maybe we could change the focus of our competitions 

[WendyB]

@benspaul When I first got my fitbit 5 years ago I was competitive.

Now I just set my goals for me and try to meet them daily. I really dont care what others do. I have many people on my leaderboard that compete in challenges etc I ignore them. Im in it for me an me alone. I dont care what they do

[AnnLondon]

There's a daily challenge (the Goal Day one) that's measuring each person against their step goal rather than total steps walked. That said, I try to walk 20,000 steps a day but have left my Fitbit goal at 10,000.

[Themkm]

I would like to see a weekly and weekend goal challenge, like the daily one but longer, like the others. Then friends with less of a goal could compete and possibly win.

I don't like when I start a challenge and invite friends, and before my friends can join, a friend invites one of his friends, who is out of our league step-wise, to join. She jumps to the top immediately, and she was the 10th person in the challenge, so my husband was unable to join because of the ten person limit. I want to restrict invitees to my challenge to just my friends.

[WendyB]

@ThemkmYou have psoted this many times.

Its life and people will invite others. Talk to them and tell them not to.

[Themkm]

Yeah, I apologize for that. I thought I deleted it in another post, didn't realize it was posted a few times. I'll ask, but thought there was an easier way. We just had a good group of friends that worked out all foe the country, but together, and I knew in real life if we worked out together, we'd ask the group if a friend could join, instead of just doing it. I guess it's just a difference in manners.

[Themkm]

Oops, can't fix the typos, "worked out all over the country" but together (through Fitbit). We are military families that used to be stationed together and keep in touch now through social media and Fitbit.

[PureEvil]

Okay, I'll admit that I used to always want to be on the top of my leaderboard...  but have since learned to be more Zen about it.  I also friended some folks who routinely bury me, so then it got used to it and learned to let it go. 

As for motivating folks, the one thing that you may do to motivate folks who are at different levels of activity is to put them all in the same challenge (so that steps are visible), but unofficially pair people up.  So based on weekly averages, the highest stepper paired with the lowest and so on.  This way, everyone will have a fair chance at winning.

[pcobb8]

For me it is about finding friends in similar positions.  I have had my fitbit for 2 months now.  I complete with my brother and sister, who are both in the same situtation as I am (overweight, same age bracket and have office jobs)  So the stats and competition become fun and engaging.  As a result of sharing tips and drving each other, we are down a combined total of 75 lbs over a span of 9-10 weeks

[Rich_Laue]

I find that my biggest conpetator in hindering my steps is myself.
For me those goal day challanges are the ones i like. Your really only competing against yourself, but have asked others to help keep you accountable.

As for the leaderboard it is fun watching you advannce past that person ypu have been just out of reach of.

[LucyAP]

Hello Fitbitters, Great to see you here! Just wanted you to know that I've gone ahead and moved your recent topic "Anyone else put off by tough competition? (or know others who are?)" to the Get Fit board. Hope this helps you to receive a response you're looking for. For your reference, you had originally posted your question in the 'Getting Started in the Fitbit Community board, which is dedicated to discussion around how to use the community and its features.

Thanks for your understanding! 🙂

[BuzzGirl260]

Also bear in mind that a fair few cheat. I know people who think stamping their feet while cleaning their teeth is the same as walking - even someone who attatches it to the dogs collar and plays ball if he's lagging behind. 

Compete with yourself 

[Rich308]

Prior to a competition let's say a workweek hustle (5 day duration) an option say "handicap is selected" which will look at the daily average of all the participants. As an example three people are competing . A - (average 7,000), B (11,000) and C (16,000) over the 5 days. That results with person A getting a daily handicap addition on the first day of (16,000-7000) 9,000. Person B gets a daily handicap addition of (16,000-11,000) 5,000. Whereas person C gets 0. On the second Person A will get another 9,000 and person B will get another 5,000 whereas person C gets zero. And so on for each of the five days. This will create a more level playing field and bring back the "friendly" into the competition.  The only drawback is if an inactive member joins the group, and has the potential of getting an unrealistic high handicap. At this point the program would not allow an inactive member to receive a handicap. I hope this will come to fruition as I really feel for those people who would like to be part of the group but due to age, health or other constraints are left out.

[PureEvil]

@Rich308,

Welcome to the community!

Years ago I had entered a feature suggestion for a option for a challenge with an 'adjusted' step count.  This sounds similar (if not mathematically, at least in spirit) to what you're suggesting.

Feel free to cast your vote and/or make comments on that thread.