Apple at 50: How the company’s health revolution changed my life at 25

This story is part of 9to5mac’s series celebrating Apple’s 50th anniversary.

April 1, 1976: 50 years ago, Apple was founded. 40 years later, to the day, I was 25 years old embarking on a health and fitness journey, and Apple was right.

April 1, 2016: I started an Apple Watch workout streak that helped me run. I had never run in my life at the age of 25, but I started closing the rings on my watch with a used elliptical at home. In the fall, I was running, and by New Year’s Day, I had lost 50 pounds.

April 1, 2017: I ran my first ever 5K race. It was the “2017 Superintendent’s 5K Challenge: A Race for Education” in Miami, Florida. My 3.1 mile run time came in at 26 minutes 46 seconds at a pace of 8 minutes, 36 seconds per mile. I ranked 151 out of 2231 participants.

Apple Watch is a symbol of living a better day

Exercising on the elliptical with my rings on my Apple Watch helped me get in shape and run my first mile. Being comfortable running a mile pushed me to participate in that first 5K race.

Soon after, I was signing up for every 5K race I could find. 10K races followed, then half-marathons. I completed seven of those 13.1 mile races before the pandemic hit and I slowed down.

Recently, the desire to run has started to return. I ran a few miles on Monday evening and that felt pretty good.

Maybe I’ll keep reporting, but no promises. I am very satisfied with daily dog ​​walks and long weekend walks.

Still, the Apple Watch and the Apple Health ecosystem keep me aware of my well-being in a way I never imagined before the watch arrived in April 2015.

The Apple Watch, to me, is a symbol of unlocking the ability to live a better day. What that means specifically can change throughout your life: from tracking a runner to tracking sleep and everything in between.

Now, as Apple turns 50, it’s their focus on health over the past decade that I hear so much every day.

Apple Health is just getting started

It’s not just the Apple Watch either. I enter my weight and other data on a smart scale that syncs to my iPhone. I track my blood pressure the same way.

And reviewing all the data with the Health app on the iPad is a great way to get the latest information and trends revealed by Apple.

And you don’t get an Apple Watch without an iPhone, and you don’t get an iPhone without a Mac.

The Mac and iPhone are where I often process my thoughts with the Journal app, which has proven to be as important as movement for me lately.

A lot of life happened to me between the ages of 25 and 35, and I’m sure it would have been a lot harder without Apple’s focus on health over the last decade.

I feel stronger and more capable at 35 than I did at 25, and Apple’s health and fitness technology has been key to making that happen.

As Apple turns 50 now, it’s also amazing to think about what a difference the company still had to make in the 40s.

You can’t help but be excited about the future when you think about how much impact Apple has had in the second half of its 50 years as a company.