My sister loves running long distance and she enjoys running on trails, especially in the summer. I'm looking to buy an armband calorie counter for my sister for christmas so she can track her calories burned, distance etc. Anyone know what they are called? Can anyone recommend a good one? Thanks!

The bodybugg became really popular thanks to Biggest Loser. Personally, I'm a fan of the Fitbit, which is less intrusive but has all the functions I need.

with the fitbit, will she be able to program it for her long distance runs?

I use Bodybugg (and there is also Body Media, essentially the same thing, available at Costco). It tracks calories burned, and you can keep track of what you eat, and what your daily deficit is. It does not keep track of heart rate, but it measures calories burned. By using the "trip" feature, it's possible to track calories burned during a workout (but again, not heart rate). You wear the Bodybugg (or BodyMedia) on your tricep.

Along with Fitbit, there's something by Jawbone (I think Jawbone Up) that looks kind of cool. You wear this one on your wrist. I don't know much about either product, but I think they are more like the Bodybugg and measure calories burned.

I wonder if you're thinking more about the Polar or Garmin brands of heart rate monitor. It looks like one part you wear on your chest which measures the heart rate, and the display part looks like a digital wrist watch. Both look very cool, I think tracking heart rate, calories, distance and other things.

The Fitbit won't require programming or calibrating. It'll simply measure her steps, distances and calories burned. On the website where the data is uploaded, she can choose to also keep track of food, weight and other measurements (heart rate, BP, glucose).

If you want to track exercise, heart rate, and calories burned, then you want to buy the Garmin watch. In addition, you usually have to buy the breast-strap separately to monitor heart rate. The watch and breast strap are quite expensive, but there are also many options/cool things you can do with it. There are cheaper garmin watches and then really expensive ones. Your sister wouldn't need the expensive one because those are for more professional athletes.

Anyway, when you plug your garmin into the computer it connects you to their website, you sign in, and then it keeps all of your data for you. Your calories burned, it displays graphs of your heart rate, your speed, maps of exactly where you ran, your end time, etc. Of course you can see most of this data as well on the watch as you run.

If you want to buy her something "noble" then the garmin watch would work. Otherwise, I'd probably look for a simpler, less expensive watch.