Elliptical Machines and Distance for Fitness Dummies

Elliptical machine

A couple of days ago we featured the lousy customer support at ICON Fitness and their NordicTrack division, which got us thinking about some of the stupid things freelancers are likely to say about those machines. Sure enough, we checked our files and found that seven-time DotD winner Greyson Ferguson had attempted to answer a question about ellipticals for eHow: "How to Calculate Distance on an Elliptical Trainer"¹ at Healthfully.com.

The question is, of course, moot for most people, since the machine's console readout tells you how far you've gone! but if you happen to have a more basic machine, one that doesn't include an odometer, then you might need to do some calculations. Ferguson, bright film graduate that he is, figured that out:

"Although most elliptical machines will display the speed you are traveling and the calories you have burned while working out, not all will show your calculated distance, which can be a useful number to know."

In reality, of course, most ellipticals will show you your step count and a timer as well as speed and calories (in fact, not all will show you calories), but let's assume that Greyson was right: not every console displays all that data. In fact, let's assume that you have a machine that doesn't show anything: did you know that, with a little ingenuity, you can still get distance?
Ferguson's "solution" was to use time and speed to calculate distance with the formula distance = speed * time (which took him a whopping 152 words!). Of course, that presupposes your elliptical displays speed... but if it doesn't; say, the console is broken (must be a NordicTrack 😒 ), a reasonably smart person can still do the calculation. All you need is a step-counter and a tape measure. Here's how:

1. Determine stride length for your elliptical: look at the manual, read it from the machine itself, or measure it yourself.
2. Count steps with a pedometer, wearable, or smartphone app
3. Calculate the distance in miles with this formula:  distance = [(stride length in inches/12) * step count] / 5280

There: easy-peezy... yet Greyson just figured you'd be able to read average speed from your console but be too stupid to display the distance. Ferguson, however, was the one who was too stupid... but not too stupid to collect yet another Dumbass of the Day award!

¹ The original has been deleted by Leaf Group, but can still be accessed using the Wayback machine at archive.org. Its URL was   ehow.com/how_5451956_calculate-distance-elliptical-trainer.html

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