Dancing

[Kfischer123]

How do I track dancing?  I am missing steps and not reaching goal because I dance three nights a week.  Thank you for your help.

[WendyB]

What tracker do you have?

Dancing should be picking up some steps

Going to call @NellyG here as she is a dancer

[Kfischer123]

I have the Charge 2.  It has never captured my dancing in the last four months.  It is messing up my goal of 10,000 steps a day even though I am dancing my butt off.  I danced two hours last night and I don't think it registered but maybe 25 steps.

[NellyG]

Hi @Kfischer123 and thanks @WendyB! As Wendy asks - what type of dancing are you doing? I am a ballroom dancer and my trackers are not accurate picking up all the steps I do, but I get heaps more than 25 steps! This morning I was practicing about 2 1/2 hours and it tracked around 2000 steps though I did heaps more than that. I have tried wearing my flex 2 (as my smallest tracker) on my wrist, body, hip and ankle comparing it to my Ionic that I wear on my wrist (both on different accounts so they dont interfere with each others step totals).

Worn on my wrist the flex 2 and the Ionic had about the same step counts. Flex 2 on my body was a little higher count but Not picking up all my steps. On my hip was much the same as on my body. The highest count was on my ankle. So I did step tests measuring the count the trackers made of 100 (counted ) paces again comparing the flex 2 and the Ionic, both on wrist and also Ionic on wrist and flex 2 on ankle. They both count much the same on my wrist - the Ionic 98 steps, the flex 2 101 or 102 steps - so pretty accurate. With flex 2 worn on my ankle the Ionic still counted 98, but the flex 2 count went up to 105, so a greater error (overcount). So I wore the Ionic on my wrist and the flex 2 on my ankle dancing and compared the two counts. I then subtracted the Ionic from the flex 2 count and reduced that number by 5% (as the flex 2 overcounts by 5% when worn on the ankle) and was left with 2000 to 3000 extra steps that the wrist worn Ionic didnt count.

So that is a lot of words to say that my dancing is being undercounted by 2 to 3 thousand steps. So now I just add a walk at a time of day when I do nothing much that nets me around 2500 steps and I figure my step total is pretty accurate.

The fact that yours is only counting 25 steps for a couple of hours dancing sounds very weird, so I'd suggest you restart your tracker several times and then see how it does. Then if it still seems way off try wearing it on your ankle and see what number you get and do some accuracy tests like i described above to see you accuratey it counts on your ankle.

Let us know how you go 

Restart your tracker

[WendyB]

Thanks @NellyG 😁

[Kfischer123]

I do ballroom dancing also.  I will put it on my ankle and see if that works better.  It is crazy to not get steps when dancing.  I dance three or four times a week for 2 plus hours.  Frustrating I don't get it on my fitbit.

[emili]

I am thinking it is because of how you have to hold your frame. if you were free style dancing or jazz you would get much more steps because your arm would be moving as well. I know when I am attempting to do what I call dancing listening to local bands, I get a ton of steps because my arms are waving and clapping. I know this isn't the bright side- but you must be really good at holding your frame to get so few steps.... 

[Kfischer123]

Yes my dance instructor is always after me about keeping a frame so I am for sure way better at it.  Maybe I should surprise him and go freestyle.  I can see the look on his face already.

[NellyG]

Give it a go on your ankle, but remember about the tendency to over count when worn there. Let us know what your step count is like!