Some Things You Might Not Know About the 12MA App

As usual, during our annual reflections post this past year, we closed the year with a short survey giving you guys the chance to give us questions or feedback about the site, app, and the future of 12 Minute Athlete.

What we realized after looking through the responses is that although we do tutorial posts on cool features every now and then, we haven’t addressed specific questions about the 12 Minute Athlete HIIT Workouts App in quite a while.

So we thought it would be helpful for you guys if we put together responses for some of the most common questions we get about the app. We hope you find them useful!

Note: Keep in mind that most of the answers below apply to iPhone only. We are still working on bringing our Android app up to speed—if you know any awesome Android developers, please send them our way!

Here are some useful things you might not know about the 12 Minute Athlete app:

How do you get the workouts on the blog in the app?

There are just a few simple steps to get the blog workouts in the app:

• Open the app and click on the Workouts tab on the bottom of the screen.
• Click on the Latest Workouts button at the top of the list of workout options.
• Scroll down and find the workout you want.

Just like on the blog, new workouts are available on the app 3-4x a week.

This feature is available to iPhone Super Athlete subscribers only.

Is there a calendar in the app where I can keep track of my monthly workouts?

Yes! If you go to the Profile tab on the bottom of the screen, the first thing you’ll see on the screen is a calendar. This will show you the days you’ve worked out during the current month using the app.

And if you want to add in additional workouts you’ve done for days you worked out doing something else than using the app, you can do that too—just press and hold the day you want to add to do so.

You can see past months by clicking on the arrow to the right of the calendar. The app will keep track of all of your days worked out since you first downloaded the app.

This feature is currently only available on the iPhone version of the app.

Can I set up an alert through the app to remind me to work out?

Yep. To do this, go to Settings > Workout Frequency.

Once there, you can set the days you want to work out and what time of day you want to be reminded, then you’ll get motivating messages on your designated days to encourage you to work out.

You’ll notice that we don’t allow for less than three days a week or more than six days a week to work out—that’s on purpose. Although something is always better than nothing, three days a week is really the minimal amount of workouts needed to make progress towards your goals.

Similarly, you should always take at least one rest day a week, which is why there’s no seven day workout option.

This feature is currently only available on the iPhone version of the app.

Where can I find exercise demos in the app?

We have short videos and written descriptions for every single exercise in the app. There are a few different ways to find these:

Option #1: Outside of a workout

You can find a list of all of the exercises by going to the Workouts tab then clicking on “All Exercises.” Once there, you’ll see a list of every exercise that has ever appeared in the app. Click on the individual exercise to view a short video and see the written description.

Option #2: On the workout description screen

If you’re about to do a workout and see the list of exercises for the workout, you can view the exercise demo for each before starting your workout.

Just click on the exercise that you want to see the workout demo of in order to see the video and written instructions. Clicking on the back arrow button or swiping left will take you back to the workout description.

Option #3: In the workout

If you forget how to do an exercise when you’re doing the workout, just click on the info button in the lefthand corner to view the video and written instructions. Clicking on the back arrow button or swiping left will take you back to the workout description.

Why is the same exercise sometimes repeated multiple times in one workout? Is this a mistake?

Nope, this is by design. In fact, in case you didn’t know, we put together all of the workouts ourselves based on workouts we’ve personally done—not one of the workouts in the app or on the site is random.

The reason that there are sometimes repeated exercises (usually this is the case with jump roping, high knees, or sprinting exercises) is that these exercises are usually used as a “break” in between strength exercises in a high cardio/conditioning workout. Don’t treat them as a break though—remember, the only way to get the most out of these workouts is to work as hard as you possibly can!

Can the app keep track of my reps I’ve done during the workout?

Can you keep track of your reps, workout times, and number of rounds in the app?

Yes! It’s super easy:

To keep track of your reps for all interval workouts (any 12, 16, and Tabata workout), simply start a workout, then after each exercise just enter your reps. You can adjust any reps at the end of the workout.

If you’re a Super Athlete subscriber, you can view all your PRs in your User Profile. Just go to the profile tab on the bottom of the screen and scroll down to see your personal records for each individual exercise, as well as the exercises you do most and your best number of rounds and times for AMRAP and Challenge workouts.

If you’re not a subscriber, you can still view your reps for each exercise at the end of your workout.

Keeping an eye on your rep count is actually a really great way to motivate yourself to work hard, because your goal can be to try and beat the number of reps you did last round.

Do you have other questions about the app or features you’d like added to future versions? Let us know in the comments!