Pace Your Music to Your Workout5-Star RatingBy Wendy Bumgardner, About.com Guide
Nothing drags your workout rhythm down as much as a slow, slow song on your music player. PaceDJ is a great app that sorts through your iTunes library or chosen playlist and then lets you select the pace of music you want for your workout. This is an easy-to-use app that is great for walkers, runners and cyclists.Get Moving at the Right TempoThe PaceDJ app is simple to set up. You can let it loose on your entire music library or select a playlist you have already built. It analyzes each song for its beats per minute. You then select a tempo that will match your workout and you have an instant music mix for that pace. They suggest 500 songs to choose from for the best mix.You can scroll through the songs selected and prioritize them with a thumbs up or thumbs down. Those you give the thumbs up to will be played first. Those you give thumbs down remain on your playlist but are at lower priority.You can choose the range of beats per minute that will be played, from 0 to 10 bpm of your chosen pace. PaceDJ will also play half tempo and double tempo songs that relate to that range. A wider range means more songs.Now, just open PaceDJ when you want to start your workout and it will play the mix for whatever tempo you choose.What is the Right Tempo for Walking Workouts?PaceDJ links to James Sundquist's list of suggested tempos for walking, running and biking at various speeds. It was fun to see this link, as he and I linked to each other long ago in the early days of the web. His suggested walking paces include 120 bpm for 3 mph, 130 bpm for 3.5 mph, 140 bpm for 4 mph, 150 bpm for 4.3 mph.How do you know what pace you want? Use our Walking Pace Calculator to find your walking pace.I have a "Race" playlist for my iPod Shuffle that I built just by eyeballing which songs I thought were peppy. Running it through PaceDJ confirmed that I was on the right track.When you are in the middle of your workout and feel like you need to speed up or slow down, you can access PaceDJ and simply hit the up or down arrow next to the Target BPM to adjust it.Bottom Line on PaceDJThis app was just what I wanted to build a race mix or a workout mix. The only thing I might want is to have suggested tunes to add.