The Zombies run! app.
The Zombies run! app.

Getting fit? There's an app for that



Gone are the days when health and fitness apps were just gimmicks for geeks. With a huge range of electronic assistants out there, a growing number of clued-in health-conscious people are using their phones to keep their health on track.

Whether you want to make sure you eat properly and sleep well or assess how well your exercise regimen is going – or just to stop yourself dying of boredom on the treadmill – you can be pretty sure that, nowadays, there’s an app for that. Out of a huge new trawl, here are the best ones to help you maintain a truly healthy lifestyle.

= Larklife

The ultimate fitness app, Larklife uses day and night wristbands to track and analyse every detail of your daily routine, from the number of steps you take to the length and quality of your sleep.

Data from the wristband is fed back into the app itself, which then gives you personally tailored appraisals and suggestions for improving your health.

A sort of health guru version of George Orwell’s Big Brother, Larklife’s constant monitoring might require too much commitment for some – and at US$149, it’s hardly cheap. Still, as an alternative to personal training for people who find it hard to stay focused on health goals, it’s pretty awesome.

US$149 (Dh547) for iPhone

Nike Training Club

For fitness lovers who find Larklife’s monitoring a little too intense, this Nike-sponsored app for women is a good, low-key alternative. Offering detailed workouts for all levels, the app comes with video tutorials, tailored music playlists, excellent progress updates and a gratifying collection of mini bonuses and rewards for goals achieved.

Free for iPhone and Android

Calorie Counter Pro

Unlike many barcode-scanning apps, Calorie Counter Pro isn’t too US-focused. Helping you tot up calorie intake, the app has more than 485,000 foods in its database, and lets you calculate weight loss or gain and set goals easily. Assuming you’re fed healthily as well as sparingly, the app also records your vitamin intake, helps you group snacks by time and will even tell you if you’re not drinking enough water.

$3.99 (Dh15) for iPhone and Android

Edamam

A truly vast recipe database, Edamam stands out among cookery apps thanks to the excellent, easily decipherable nutritional information attached to each dish. With filters for specific requirements such as gluten-free, low sodium and vegan diets, it makes cooking varied healthy food that bit easier. It looks pretty, too, with the appetising photos accompanying each healthy recipe inevitably a bit more enticing on the iPad version.

Free for iPhone and Android

Moves

Pedometer apps have been around for a while, but Moves takes the genre to a new level of convenience and sophistication. It can measure walking, running and cycling, removing the need to switch among apps. Even better, it presents you with your daily activity as a handy line map, making it easy to root out lazy periods and to gauge and adjust how your daily exertion levels ebb and flow.

Free for iPhone

Yoga Studio

OK, so you can’t really squeeze an entire yoga studio onto a smartphone screen, but this exercise app is still one of the best around for home use.

With detailed written instructions complementing a set of 30 yoga class videos, this smoothly flowing app allows you to knit instructional sections together to create your own routine. It’s great for fitness-seekers too busy to make it to the gym at fixed times or for people who want a guided top-up between classes.

$2.99 (Dh11) for iPhone and Android

Primal Paleo

Recreating a Stone Age diet in the modern world is no easy feat but this app certainly makes the process easier.

Targeted at people who believe a largely pre-agricultural diet of raw and whole foods is healthier, Primal Paleo helps you pick out unprocessed, in-season foods and offers recipe ideas that won’t damage their nutrients. Complemented by a choice of “Paleo exercises”, this app’s tone may be tongue-in-cheek but whether you buy into its Stone Age revivalist shtick or not, its diet and fitness advice is innovatively presented and sound.

$1.99 (Dh7) for iPhone and Android

Trendweight

If you’re one of those people whose weight bounces up and down from day to day, this app is a great way of looking at the bigger weight-loss picture. Trendweight maps your daily weight data graphically as a rising and sinking line, smoothing off daily peaks and troughs to reveal your general trend. Mapped against a self-declared goal weight and providing both body-fat tracking and detailed breakdowns of calories burnt, Trendweight means you can track your weight without worrying about drinking water before you jump on the scales.

Free for iPhone and Android

Sleep Bot Tracker – Sleep Suite

A proper night’s rest is as essential to good health as food and exercise, and this app is arguably the best around for measuring and adapting your sleep patterns.

Activated by a simple touch-on, touch-off screen tap, the app creates graphs showing sleep length and patterns. It also enables you to calculate sleep debt after a period of scanty rest.

While a sleep-obsessed insomniac might find the clearly presented information graphs here more worrying than calming, Sleep Bot can be a helpful tool for making sure you get the right length and quality of sleep.

Free for iPhone and Android

Zombies, Run!

For a bit of light relief, people who find their exercise routine a massive drag should try this wonderfully silly app-turned-game. With a crescendo of groans coming through their headphones after 100 metres of running, lazy runners get an extra incentive by pretending that they are being chased by zombies.

With 30 missions to choose from, the app also has settings for stop-start-stop interval training in the form of “Zombie chases”. It’s great fun but users should remember that someone who looks like they’re fleeing undead flesh-eaters can easily scare the wits out of -passers-by.

$7.99 (Dh29) for Android, iPhone and Windows Phone

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Rating: 1/5

If you go
Where to stay: Courtyard by Marriott Titusville Kennedy Space Centre has unparalleled views of the Indian River. Alligators can be spotted from hotel room balconies, as can several rocket launch sites. The hotel also boasts cool space-themed decor.

When to go: Florida is best experienced during the winter months, from November to May, before the humidity kicks in.

How to get there: Emirates currently flies from Dubai to Orlando five times a week.

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Stars: Jaideep Ahlawat, Ishwak Singh, Lc Sekhose, Merenla Imsong

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Game Changer

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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

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The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”

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