80 MACWORLD SEPTEMBER 2020
FEATURE STAY IN SHAPE WITH APPLEthem more positively. Provided you don’t
try to close your Move ring simply by
swiping your arm back and forth while
vegging out in an armchair—which is
actually possible—these can serve as
foundations for healthy practices in these
limiting times.
How to close your Exercise ring
The Exercise ring sounds like it would be
the hardest ring to close. Unless you start
a workout, the ring closes by determining
how much your heart rate goes above a
value determined by factors like your age
or weight. Keep up that heart rate for 30
minutes, and your green ring will close. It’s
a lot easier than it probably sounds. Before
the pandemic, my Apple Watch would
normally ask me if I wanted to log
my daily walk to work from the train
station as an Outdoor Walk workout,
and doing that twice a day would
almost always close the ring.
But it gets even simpler. You can
quickly close your Exercise ring by
opening the Workout app on your
Apple Watch and then scrolling
down to the bottom and tapping
Add Workout. Tap Other in the
screen that pops up, and set it for an
open goal. Just keep that running
for 30 minutes, and your Exercise
ring will close. To give you an idea
of how well it works, I closed my
activity right while writing this story. As a
bonus, the Move ring also closes a little
more quickly while a workout is running.
You can pair this Other workout with
household chores if you wish, but closing
the ring doesn’t have to be that simple.
Even if you don’t feel comfortable about
going outside to exercise, you can get a
decent 30-minute workout just by
performing some old exercise standbys
like push-ups, sit-ups, and burpees in your
home. (If you add a Workout for “High
Intensity Interval Training,” your Apple
Watch will usually correctly log such
activities.) For a more guided workout,
gyms and similar fitness organizations are
currently offering a lot of their normally
paid online training services for free, andEven jumping jacks will work with this.