“If I can save just one person, it will all be worthwhile.”

Michael: What do you use to track your activities?

Dan: I use a Garmin Fenix 3 to track my heart rate, sleep, daily steps, walking, running and cycling events. It’s a large watch, but has 16 hour battery life, which can be charged whilst recording an activity, which is necessary during long-distance events.

It syncs wirelessly to my phone via Garmin Connect, which then syncs with Strava and Apple Health. From there, the data is synced to Gyroscope, where I can combine it with my weight and other data.

Michael: What’s your main goal? Has Gyroscope helped you achieve it?

Dan: Initially, I was embarrassed that I let myself get into such an unhealthy condition. Last summer, I read that more and more of the U.K. population was becoming overweight and sedentary. Child obesity and low activity rates shocked me — one 2012 statistic from Public Health England quoted that only 21% of boys age 5–15 years were doing the recommended one hour of activity a day, and only 16% of girls.

It was this statistic that made me decide to go public and announce my fight against heart disease.

Shortly after, I set up my blog and Twitter account. My goal has been to prevent anyone else from going through what I did. If I can save just one person, it will all be worthwhile.

Gyroscope allows me to monitor my progress and visually share my rides, along with the photos I’ve taken during them.

“Knowing that I will be sharing a Gyroscope card on Twitter motivates me to go that extra distance!”

I’ve found that a tweet with a Gyroscope card will reach a far greater audience with much higher engagement, than a tweet with just a standard image. I don’t think people are particularly interested if you say you’ve done 62 miles — they’re drawn in by a photo or fun stats like the number of cookies or donuts burned.