The Commoner Visits Nike Town

What happens when you mix the commoner and three of my favorite things?  Mayhem and a Nike employee who goes home with a head ache.


What three favorite things you ask? New York City of course, Nike, and Techy gadgets.  So imagine my delight when I walked into Nike Town and saw the beautiful podium filled  with Nike Fuel bands.


You are wondering what the fuel band is?  You are not alone.  All I could find out about before Nike Town was that it told you how many calories you burned all day long from everything you do. But I learned so much more that day.

You have to understand-I have a Nike sensor in my shoe, I have an app on my phone that changes music to keep up with me, tells me my pace, how far to go-everything.  I also have a band on my wrist that tells me the same thing-but that I can constantly look and obsess at.  So the chance to have something that does this 24/7 is too much for me to pass up.

I pulled myself right up to an empty (or almost empty) spot at the kiosk and right away I was caught up in the whole thing.  Now mind you there was a rather smart looking dapper urbanite dude in his twenties.  Now this is important for many reasons.  For one it validated that my questions weren't stupid and second it gave me a partner in comedy.  

The Nike dude explained the whole thing.  It measures everything you do and converts it into Nike Fuel Points-you set a goal and try to achieve this.  So I think this is great and I can wear it while I run in addition to my other stuff so I get all my credit.  Does it work on my spin class?  Um no-it doesn't work in cycling because it measures arm movement.  What do I get with those points Nike Gear?  Apparently all I get is a good feeling.

 Oh-hipster dude is losing patience in the fact that I budded in to his sales questions (I'm at my pushiest when I'm in NY)  I have one question he says-does it work when I drive-(Really? Why would you burn any points when you drive) no-how about push ups?  No because your arms don't move.  So basically it measures EVERYTHING except cycling, pushups, and driving.  Probably Irish dancing too because you don't move your arms.


So what are fuel points and what can you do with them and what do they mean and how do you set a goal and how many calories does it equal.  See those last 4 words?  That's where we lost the Nike dude and worked together on the problem -myself and the hipster urbanite. 


You see fuel points are some made up math formula that Nike came up with-I'm sure as a joke-and they IN NO WAY CORRELATE TO CALORIES-DO YOU UNDERSTAND?  We didn't and we came to the conclusion -as we ignored Nike Dude that you divide nike fuel by 1/3 to get calories.  By this time Nike dude was pulling his hair out.


Well now I've tried one on and figured I'm a small.  But that doesn't matter because they don't have any more.  And guess what -NY Nike Town is the only place in THE WHOLE COUNTRY to buy them.   So hipster urbanite was going to come in at 10 the next day-I was going back to California and NO THEY DON"T HAVE THEM IN SAN FRANCISCO. But the odds were good of me getting one the next day because I was a small if I came back at 10.


By the time I left I decided the whole thing was stupid because for just 50 dollars more I could get the Nike+ With GPS.  That was my next stop.  Niketown will never be the same.