Category: Sports and Technology

Pocket Radar – More than a Speed Gun for Tennis Serves

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According to Wikipedia Samuel Groth hit the fastest recorded tennis serve at 163.7 mph. Venus Williams tops the list for women at 129.0 mph.

How fast can you hit your tennis serve?

Too often sports enthusiasts think that speed guns, such as Pocket Radar, can only be used to measure the speed of serves. With a little imagination Pocket Radar can be used in a variety of ways to teach tennis players the subtleties of the sport, not just the speed of their serves. Some examples follow:

A. Compare the speed for the forehand and backhand groundstrokes. Most players hit their forehands with greater pace.
• Are their technical or physical reasons the backhand is hit with less pace?
• What are the tactical implications of being able to hit one groundstroke at a faster pace than the other? – For example, if the backhand is hit with less pace, should a player try to place it, keep it in play, and create offense with the forehand?

B. Compare the speed of groundstrokes based on the spin (topspin, flat, underspin).
• Generally speaking, these results will have tactical implications. When is it appropriate to hit with topspin? Underspin? What is the proper mix of spin and pace? What type of spin is best for keeping the ball in play? What type of spin is best for trying to hit a ball past the opponent?pocket radar

C. Compare the speed of groundstrokes based on the angle of the shot.
• Again, there may be technical and tactical reasons for a variation in the pace of the ball based on its angle. Usually a sharply angled ball will be hit with less pace because it may be hit with a shorter backswing or it is hit with more spin to ensure control. The purpose of a sharply angled ball is to hit it away from the opponent. In many cases, pace is not necessary to win the point.

D. Measure the pace of the serve to the deuce and ad service courts? Most likely players can hit to one court at a faster speed. For examples, righties may be able to hit harder to the deuce court.
• Are there technical or physical reasons for the difference in speed to the two courts? For example, righties may have to hit with more spin to the ad court, which could decrease the speed of the serve.
• What are the tactical implications – For example: should righties go for more aces in the deuce court, while using placement and consistency to win points in the ad court?
At a more advanced level, the speed of a serve can be measured to the inside corner, outside corner, and “at the body” for both courts. Again, the variation in speed for these six locations may have technical, physical, and tactical implications.

E. Compare the speed for serves or groundstrokes over time.
• It is virtually impossible to increase the pace of any shot overnight. There are many reasons to measure the pace of a specific shot over time. For example, this may be a way to measure how a person is recovering from an injury, it may show the effects of participating in a strength/agility/fitness program, or it may show the effects of taking lessons to improve a specific technique. Small changes may occur over months, rather than weeks or days.

It is fun to coach with software and technology devices, such as Pocket Radar. They provide another way of helping students understand how to play the sport and make it more fun!

So, how fast is your serve?

Video Capabilities Available for Coaches at All Levels

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Forty years ago, only the top sports programs used video tape analysis to enhance an athlete’s performance. Video tape equipment was extremely expensive, it was temperamental to use, and the quality of the tape was inferior, by today’s standards.

Over the years, Dartfish established itself as a leader in sports video analysis. Its software allowed for easy analysis of an athlete’s performance, including slow motion and side-by-side comparisons. While Dartfish products were a significant improvement, their system was still fairly expense.

Today, most cameras and cell phones have the ability to capture high quality video and multiple apps allow for video analysis. In short, it is possible for parents, little league coaches, and tennis professionals to video their athletes and provide instant feedback.

For example, Ubersense allows coaches to record high definition video and playback frame-by-frame. It includes slow motion analysis, zoom and advanced drawing tools, and the ability to compare videos side-by-side. In short, coaches have access to video capabilities that far exceed the capabilities of 40 years ago, at a fraction of the cost.

In addition to Ubersense, parents and coaches may want to consider apps such as Coach’s Eye, FastCam, or SloPro.

Will Mobile Application for Golf Eliminate Beer Cart Women?

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Mondays are slow days for the printed media. and April 16, must have been the slowest in the history of the Daily Camera.

The front page articles discussed Hessie Trailhead parking, the war in Afghanistan, 4/20 at CU, homeless housing,

Earth Day, closing day at Eldora Ski area, and a golf application for the Indian Peaks Golf Course. The latter two sports-related articles, with pictures, filled over half of the column inches on the page. If hiking and pot smoking are considered as recreational activities then about 80% of the front page was related to sports.

Focusing on the golf app…

While the article, “There’s an App for that Golf Stroke,” was interesting, it was essentially a free front-page advertisement for golf, Indian Peaks, and the application.

The main benefits of this app are that it allows golfers to pinpoint their GPS location on the course, determine yardage to the green, and alert the user of any hazards between their position and the green. Many other products provide some of these services – one of them is called a scorecard.

In addition, users will also be able to use the app to pull up canned tips from the golf pro for each hole, order food, schedule tee times, and sign up for golf lessons. The article did not state whether the app would eliminate the need for beer cart women, say a prayer prior to shots out of a trap, locate balls lost in the rough, or retrieve them from the water hazards. For many golfers, these are the essentials of the sport.

I lacked a full appreciation for the cell-phone game application Angry Birds when it first came out. Unfortunately the value of this application is also lost on me.

 

Sports Gadgets – Cyclists Can Check Vital Feedback Safely

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Have you ever been jogging or biking and glanced at your watch to check your pace and crashed and burned? Reportedly that’s what happened to Ian Andes.

For those who don’t know Mr. Andes, he is the inventor of Sportiiiis. He has a story that every athlete can relate to, a brand name that is clever, and a product that sounds rather ingenuous.

In simplistic terms, Sport-iiiis might be called a sports version of Google Goggles. The product is a device that is attached to a person’s sunglasses. For bicyclists, the device use audible prompts and visual colored-LED displays to present performance data from an ANT+ cycling computer attached to the bicycle. This allows cyclists to safely receive vital feedback and plan their output (cadence, speed, or heart rate) when they are going down a hill at 60 mph, scaling Independence Pass, or passing a pack of other racers.

The manufacturers tout both the safety aspects of the glasses and the ability to monitor performance as obvious reasons for their use.

Gimmick or godsend?

For more information check it out at http://4iiii.com/.

 

Portable Biofeedback System for Runners

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Twenty years ago sports gadgets were typically limited to fancy wristwatches. Physiological research was typically done in the lab with treadmills and expensive equipment that required lots of wires and measuring devices.

Today the gadgets are less expensive, more portable, and “reasonably” priced for the serious athlete.

For example, consider the Pear Square device by Pear Sports.

The biofeedback training system costs $250 and includes a foot pod, wireless heart rate sensor and strap, and earphones with a retention system. The user can select music and a training program for their workout.  From there the heart monitor and foot pod measure performance. The interactive audio coaching or software provides commentary about whether the runner is meeting the goals (heart rate, pace, time, and distance) of their training plan.

Its simple to use.

For more information contact Pear Sports at http://pearsports.com/

Technology in Sports Equipment – Ski Goggles

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Skiers and boarders get all the cool stuff!

They wear jackets that are warmer and lighter and they have mobile aps to keep track of their number of runs on the slopes. Thanks to Zeal Optics of Boulder, they now have goggles with a built-in camera to capture all their bumps and turns on the slopes.

In touting their iON goggle, the company’s press release stated, “The goggle-wearer pushes buttons located on the outside of the goggles to operate the camera. The goggles have a viewfinder and controls that run on a rechargeable battery that works for up to six hours. The camera in the goggles has a 170-degree wide-angle lens to capture images in a “wide periphery.” The goggles come with software that allows users to adjust camera settings. Videos and pictures can be downloaded to computers through a mini-USB connection. The goggles also have a micro-SD card that can be used to show the videos and pictures on computers and TVs. Other goggles from Zeal offer GPS-related information that allows users to track altitude, speed, and temperature. The new goggles retail for $399.”

Will the iON goggles be a big hit? Can the goggles be used in ways that allow skiers to improve their skills or are they strictly an entertainment device? Will owners find crossover uses for their goggles – mountain biking, rock climbing, gardening, mowing the lawn, or après-ski activity? Will Zeal develop comparable products to allow sports enthusiasts to record the big ace on match point, the hole-in-one, or the diving catch to capture the city softball championship?

Sports are no longer as simple as they once were – strap on your skis and have a good time. For better or worse, technology has become a bigger part of the way enthusiasts enjoy their favorite sport. And it has become necessary for manufacturers to develop new products and continually change (and hopefully improve) their current product lines to stay afloat.

Further information about Zeal Optics can be found at www.zealoptics.com.

 

Mobile Apps Hit the Slopes

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When I first got my smart phone I couldn’t wait to tell my wife about all of the great applications – the New York Times, NFL Mobile, and Navigation.  She couldn’t wait to tell me about Angry Birds.

Very quickly, I learned that applications were called apps and there is an app for just about everything. To illustrate this point I had a skier friend enthusiastically tell me about the apps for his sport as he drove up to the slopes for the last run of the 2010-2011 season. I am not a frequent skier, but his discussion about the use of apps in his sport was intriguing.

As I quickly learned, Colorado’s ski companies are using social media (Facebook, Twitter, and mobile applications) to let the world know about everything from recent snowfall to special online deals to number of runs skied.

One of my friends favorite apps used the RFID tags on season tickets to track the number of days skied and vertical miles logged. He and his buddies used the app for “bragging rights” and to determine who bought the beers at the end of the day. Another option allows users with smart phones to get alerts when friends are on the mountain. Obviously, users had to opt into these options to allow this type of tracking.

Another app, Realski, allows users to take pictures and geotag them. On the slopes, users can then relocate that special powder or terrain. Off the slopes it may be used to help find the car in the parking lot after a long day on the slopes or a late night in the watering holes.

Ski operators market the mobile apps as a tool for enhancing the skier/boarder experience. As well, they also see it as an opportunity to increase communications with their customers and strengthen brand loyalty. In theory everyone wins.

This brief post is not intended to be a comprehensive review of ski and boarder mobile aps, rather it illustrates how they are being applied to recreation activities to improve a person’s  sporting experience and to strengthen companys’ financial stakes in those sports. Watch for similar apps in your favorite sports and recreational activities.