Personal trainer uses Wii for workouts

As anyone who's managed to get their hands on a Wii will no doubt have already discovered, it's relatively easy to work up a sweat and lose some pounds using Nintendo's little white box. Now, the real life activity that's required to succeed at virtual Wii Sports has been picked up on by a personal trainer from Glasgow, Scotland: Zander Urquhart found that kids and adults alike don't mind doing exercise when it's accompanied by on-screen actions by the player's Mii, and is using the Wii specifically as an exercise machine. Zander is apparently the first fitness expert to have seen the potential for the Wii in the field of personal training, but we have a strong feeling he won't be the last. Even if the idea doesn't catch on, we suspect he'll have a healthy stream of geeky customers coming into the gym as long as the Wii stock shortage continues to exist (which, judging by the sporadic shortages of the 10 month old DS Lite, could be some time yet). Be honest with us: have you lost any weight thanks to your Wii?

[Via The Raw Feed. Image credit]

[David @ Apr 9th 2007 10:07AM]

i was lucky and just happened to get one. walked into a gamestop to waste some time with my girlfriend, and we were both pointing at wii games, until i said "but we need to find one first". the guy behind the counter goes "well... we've got a box in the back". so i bought it, and between wario ware (i jump around a lot to that game... is that just me?), and wii sports, i've been pretty tired after playing. i plan to work wii'ing into my workout routine.

[GamerJunkie @ Apr 9th 2007 10:24AM]

This looks like no different than a couch potato swinging a remote, hardly exercise.

Wiimote has no weight, what kind of exercise is that?

They need to create a Wiimote with some extra weight added for resistance training.

[Jerrison Chang @ Apr 9th 2007 10:41AM]

Wii is a fun, healthy console for every one.
i love Wii!!!
http://ilovewii.blogspot.com/

[CowboyGA @ Apr 9th 2007 10:51AM]

I can hear the call to action now:

"Little Johnny, get off your lazy rear and play some video games! Link won't save the day by himself, and you're not getting any thinner watching TV!"

I do wish they'd come up with a two-nunchuck game. That way, you can sport wrist weights and actually work out both arms. As goofy as it sounds, I'd give it a shot.

[wei @ Apr 9th 2007 11:09AM]

has anyone noticed the way the kid in the picture is wearing the wrist strap? no wonder morons break their straps and lob their controllers into their TVs

[McGinley @ Apr 9th 2007 11:19AM]

Maybe Microsoft should come up with some form of weight loss attachment for the xbox 360?

[Heather @ Apr 9th 2007 11:54AM]

In response to Wei...the kid in the picture is wearing the wrist strap correctly, tightened to the size of his wrist. The extra hangs off. Nintendo recalled the earlier strap because the straps themselves were breaking...not because "morons" were wearing them incorrectly or purposely lobbing them into TVs.

[Fatass of Kickassness @ Apr 9th 2007 12:31PM]

Go read your manual, Heather. The extra is supposed to be inbetween the wrist and the Wii remote. If the extra is hanging off, and you let go of the Wii remote, all that will do is force the stopper back to the end of the Wrist Strap, causing more force on the string between the remote and breaking it. Thats probably why all these morons have been breaking the Wii straps.

[wei @ Apr 9th 2007 1:03PM]

@Heather:

Actually, you're wrong on both counts. Fatass of Kickassness has it right, in that the extra is between the wrist and the remote. Have you used a wii remote before? Furthermore, it looks like the kid in the picture is even wearing the strap on the thin portion of the strap which connects the strap to the remote itself. You can tell by how thin the strap around his hand is. Hence, "morons". I've had a wii since launch and still can't fathom how people have been so careless with their expensive devices.

[Ashley Jones @ Apr 9th 2007 12:00PM]

Let me know when they come out with Road Rash that can be hooked up to an exercise bike

[Heather @ Apr 9th 2007 1:09PM]

I replied earlier to rescind first comment, but for some reason they didn't post it. My mistake. I have used a Wii before and wear the remote correctly...just didn't look @ the picture close enough.

Still, it was my understanding that the earlier Wii strap breakage happened even when people were wearing the remotes correctly.

[J. Evans Turner @ Apr 13th 2007 9:43AM]

If you consider throwing like a major-league pitcher "correct". ;)

[Justin @ Apr 9th 2007 1:42PM]

I've lost weight from using my PS3...well actually from buying my PS3, seeing how I can no longer afford to buy food.

[dave @ Apr 9th 2007 11:53PM]

I've lost weight thanks to excersize and diet. I have fun playing my Wii. You'd really have to be out of shape to consider playing the Wii a workout.

I mean, I'm all for the merging of exersize and fun, but let's not go nuts here people. The Wii is a toy, not an excersize machine.

Get an mp3 player and go for a run for god sakes.

[Matt @ May 18th 2007 1:21AM]

The reason kids are wearing the wrist strap wrong like in the picture is because Tiger Woods does the same thing in the ad for his game. One minute he's walking in the room with a turkey sandwich, the next they go back to him and he's got the wrist strap on wrong. Clearly, some one on the shoot put it on for him, because I can't even figure out how you would cinch it tight that way. I'm surprised Nintendo didn't jump on EA for that and make them pull the ad or at least reshoot that part.