Outdoor biking added randomly

[KBMD]

Every few days "outdoor biking" randomly shows up as an activity I've done for 20 mins-30 mins. And gives me 20-30 calories for it. What's going on?

[SteveH · Accepted solution]

Fitbit recently introduced a feature called SmartTrack that automatically logs activity based on its interpretation of your movement. It sometimes gets it wrong, as in this case. This article will help you configure it or, if you prefer, disable it.

http://help.fitbit.com/articles/en_US/Help_article/SmartTrack-FAQs/

[KBMD]

Thanks! I've disabled the Smart Tracker as it clearly needs more work before it will be useful.

[PickStrum]

Same problem here. Tons of false reports. It used to be pretty accurate in tracking my sleep and activity. Now it's just allover the place and the web GUI won't even make me fix it!

I feel for you guys trying to add functionality but complexity will haunt you. Keep it simple!

[ltwt]

I read the article you referred to.    Rather than just turning the feature off or calling the activity something else, I'd like to figure out what it was that Fitbit called "outdoor bike."  Can you help me accomplish that?

I mean, eventually winter may end, and I may actually get the bike out and go for a ride: what then?  If I have disabled "outdoor bike," will Fitbit invent some other name for this activity?  How confusing will that be?

In MY case, the first day I had the device, while I was still sitting at the computer trying to set it up, it recorded "outdoor bike" for something like 20 minutes.  It did the same a few days later--again when I was basically at the computer all day.  I might have gotten up and moved around the house some, but nothing vigorous and nothing outdoors (where I live the smog was dangerous that day), so--unlike the original questioner who was walking the mall during the time she got credit for "outdoor bike"--I have NO idea what would have caused Fitbit to isolate an interval and so designate it.  Please give me some clues about how to figure it out, as I would like to get the full benefit of what the device CAN do.  Thanks too much.

[Julia_G]

Hi, @ltwt , I obviously have no definitive answer to your question... but I noticed that my Charge HR gave me credit for "outdoor bike" while I was sitting at the dinner table on New Year's Eve.  So, I must have met Fitbit's factors...  Guessing what they might be:

I think, in the first place, it must not detect steps (because no steps when biking) but should detect elevated heart rate.  We were all drinking, since it was NYE, afterall, and I was making a big effort to be entertaining (to thank my hosts for having me) and telling lots of entertaining stories about life in a small English village.  There was a lot of laughter, so my heart rate was definitely raised.  But, since I was at the table, no steps.

Besides no steps and elevated heartrate, the other thing I thought was maybe one of the accelerometers detected forward motion?  Maybe I repeatedly leaned forward at the table to tell my stories...

My takeaway from this was not that this is total rubbish, even though it did get it wrong!  But, actually, something unusual was going on, and the program made its best guess.

I was quite impressed, in fact.

[Suzikay1]

FWIW, my Charge HR frequently registers sex as Outdoor Biking. I was just trying to figure out why.

[ltwt]

Julia:  good deductive reasoning!  thanks for your insight

---

@Julia_G wrote:

Hi, @ltwt , I obviously have no definitive answer to your question... but I noticed that my Charge HR gave me credit for "outdoor bike" while I was sitting at the dinner table on New Year's Eve.  So, I must have met Fitbit's factors...  Guessing what they might be:

I think, in the first place, it must not detect steps (because no steps when biking) but should detect elevated heart rate.  We were all drinking, since it was NYE, afterall, and I was making a big effort to be entertaining (to thank my hosts for having me) and telling lots of entertaining stories about life in a small English village.  There was a lot of laughter, so my heart rate was definitely raised.  But, since I was at the table, no steps.

Besides no steps and elevated heartrate, the other thing I thought was maybe one of the accelerometers detected forward motion?  Maybe I repeatedly leaned forward at the table to tell my stories...

My takeaway from this was not that this is total rubbish, even though it did get it wrong!  But, actually, something unusual was going on, and the program made its best guess.

I was quite impressed, in fact.

---

[ltwt]

---

@Suzikay1 wrote:

FWIW, my Charge HR frequently registers sex as Outdoor Biking. I was just trying to figure out why.

---

Julia may have part of that answer (see her response).

Meantime, thanks for this response: It gave me a grin.

[Julia_G]

@Suzikay1 , when you're over 60 telling entertaining stoires over dinner may be the closest one gets... after all, SmartTrack doesn't kick in until it detects a minimum of 10 minutes!

But I like the opportunity for a new euphemism!  Fancy a bit of nudge nudge, wink wink, outdoor biking tonight?

[bike2work]

My Charge HR detects Outdoor Biking when I'm walking pushing the lawn mower. However, when I'm actually biking, it doesn't detect anything.

[lisamillerd]

Mine counts sex as 'outdoor biking' for some bizarre reason. I'm going to disable it now! 

[JuanJoFitbit]

@lisamillerd It's great to see you in the Community! Seems weird that your tracker recognized another activity different from "Outdoor Biking". I'd like you to provide a screenshot of the page that shows that activity instead of outdoor biking. This will help me to determine why this happened.

Looking forward to your response my friend! 

[MichaelC27]

Whenever I mow my lawn it registers as "Outdoor bike ride" so I just go into the edit facility and and change it to Lawn Mowing. It did register lawn mowing as Elliptical exerciser when I first got it but only the once. Just check the time and duration of the exercise on your app and you should be able to remember what you were doing at the time.

[lisamillerd]

@JuanJoFitbit Oh no, I meant that when I was having sex it logged part of the time as "outdoor bike." I imagine due to elevated heart rate?? Obviously I don't expect "Sex" to be logged automatically haha. I just disabled the outdoor biking tracking because I don't have a bike anyway. 

[Psychologydude]

I think it reads me as outdoor biking when I'm playing guitar (standing up rocking out). Perhaps you're running into this, too.

[pauliewallnutts]

lol sex same here was like what the hell i didn't get on a bike today.

[AnnaVIC]

That's what I thought too, that it detects a raised stationary HR because my HR goes up when I sing, and that's when it records my "bike" event. Maybe leaning episodically on the microphone does something too LOL!

thanks julia!!

[Beelady11]

How come this is marked as "solved"? 

So far all the annoying bugs on this expensive plastic bracelet, aka Charge 3 have official solutions such as ''disable the feature" or  " suggest a new feature" or some other nonsense.

I got mine to track sleep; it lights up like a disco all night (despite turning down the brightness, disabling auto wake up. Etc..  ). The only solution seems to be putting a thick wristband over it. This has been regularly reported by users of fitbits for 4+ years and been ignored.

I can't even trust mine to count flights of stairs. Sometimes it doesn't count them at all and sometimes (like today) I've apparently climbed 56 flights. NO I haven't. This has also been reported multiple times and nothing done about it.

I don't own a bike and yet I regularly cycle, according to this thing. Again reported by many users over at least 3 years and the advice? Disable the feature.

Why does anyone buy another fitbit? When this one needs replacing I'll be going for a make that actually values it's customers, certainly not a Fitbit.

[srbbass]

I play the upright bass and when I gig or practice m, it tags me as doing outdoor bike workout also