Lately I've been going to more than my fair share of organized gym classes, in particular spinning, and one thing I've noticed is that good instructors are really on top of their playlists. I've also been spending some time just alone working out at the gym, and I've noticed that I am *not* on top of my playlist! So in an effort to fix that I've been walking through my music library and looking at a lot of workout and BPM-related apps. Two that I've identified as winners are BeatGauge, which is a desktop app for Mac that instruments all your existing music with BPM ratings, and Splyce, which is an iOS music player that's BPM and workout-centric. I think we can all agree that the built-in iOS music player is crap, especially for working out. It's filled with junk I don't want and does things like make the play/pause button super tiny and in the corner. Fortunately, lots of folks have stepped in to fill the gap, but I particularly like Splyce because it's free, and it fits the way I work out. It lets me use my own playlist but tells me the BPM of all the upcoming songs and also has kind of an "intensity meter" that it uses to display the song. Today I used it for an elliptical session and I felt like I got about 10-15% more out of my workout, without even changing my music. That's pretty good, for free!
