The UpDown Fitness app, which launched its second version last month, offers users personalized workouts.
Traveling the country as an implementation specialist for Epic Systems was good for Chris Freise’s wallet, but not his waistline. In 2013, life on the go was catching up to him.
“I was on a plane thinking about how unhealthy I’d been living,” he recalls. “I was staying in hotels, sleeping in a different bed each night and eating a lot of fast food.”
While the motivation to shed the extra pounds was there, figuring out how to shed them was not. But that changed during his search for an app that could do the thinking for him. The unsatisfying results led not only to a preoccupation with how to get fit, but also with how it could fatten his wallet in the process.
Last November, Freise, 26, his brother Mike, 25, and friend Jes Greenwood, 31, launched UpDown Fitness, an app aimed at helping people achieve their fitness goals by providing customized workout routines based on a user’s body specs and fitness goals. Five months later, the app has seen 16,000 downloads, with upwards of 10,000 active users.
“What really makes our product unique is that it provides a really personalized experience,” Chris says.
Setting UpDown Fitness apart from thousands of other exercise apps is its proprietary algorithm, developed by Greenwood.
To produce a personalized workout routine, says Greenwood, the algorithm first models how the human body produces power from a numerical analysis of actual workout data.
“Combining that data with the mathematical model of a person’s body lets us customize routines, track a person accurately and build them up over time,” he says.
Upon signing up, users start with a model based on an average person, which they can adjust to reflect their own weaknesses or strengths.
“The algorithm adjusts what routine it gives based upon what you tell it and will build you up over time,” he explains. “The more you work out, the more accurate it gets.”
Until now, the company has relied primarily on conventional advertising, such as Google Adwords, but is eyeing partnerships with gym owners, who, in essence, would function as distributors by giving the app to their members.
“It will improve the gym experience and help owners with member retention,” says Mike Freise. “Members will be able to participate in gym leaderboards and other communal activities.”
Version 2.0 launched on May 2 and will soon become a subscription service costing $12 per month or $10 a month with a year commitment. Subscribers earn tokens when using the app, which they can cash in for gift cards to local shops and restaurants. They’ll also have access to a full library of workouts, and can save up to 100 customized workouts.
“I think the value is pretty good,” says Chris.
The subscriber data streaming back into the company may have good value as well. Chris foresees the day UpDown Fitness provides custom meal plans or discounted insurance premiums based on workout frequency, duration and intensity.
The business launched with $100,000 of seed money; a second round of fundraising began earlier this year.
Chris has lost about 15 to 20 pounds using his app. But all three co-founders agree that building their own company has been a much bigger workout.
“It’s been harder than I ever thought it would be,” says Chris. “Personal relationships will suffer, even when you’re with your family, because it is always on your mind. Working at Epic is a cakewalk compared to this.”
