In June 2022, Netflix released a new documentary series titled 'The Future Of' which muses on what the future may look like in so many...

Netflix's The Future Of...Sports and how Precision Sports Technology is contributing

In June 2022, Netflix released a new documentary series titled 'The Future Of' which muses on what the future may look like in so many aspects of our lives: from house plants to gaming, from cheeseburgers to fashion. Industry experts and visionaries are interviewed to discuss the possibilities of technology in the short, medium to far future in all these different areas.

Of course, one that we paid close attention to was The Future Of...Sports! Which opens with "Welcome to the future of sports, where AI, robotics and bioengineering elevate our game to amazing new heights".

A lot of the technologies mentioned in the show are based in the far and uncertain future, where the ethics and fairness around exoskeletons and biological enhancements will be a top philosophical concern, and one not to be taken lightly.

However, in the short to medium term, the most effective technological developments will be in the management of athletes: how to maximise performance while minimising risk of injury.

"Your favourite pros are faster, stronger and taller than ever" the narrator reads, showing finds from Sedeaud et al. Secular trend: morphology and performance.

The Wu Tsai Human Performance Alliance is a collection of sports science and sports medicine centres of excellence across the US that are working together to drive human performance forward by figuring out the greatest risks of injury, how to mitigate risk and how to speed time to recovery. "The Human Performance Alliance believes one powerful new tool that could keep future athletes healthy and winning is twinning.

Twinning is a powerful concept, and after watching the documentary it's clear that Precision Sports Technology will play a key role in this.

Dr. Sam Ward of UC San Diego explains "The goal is to create individualised digital twins to make precision health decisions about elite performers. That person's sleep cycle, nutrition, movement are all fed into a computer. We envision a scenario where we can measure the right variables about a professional pitcher and make a decision about whether or not they should be done after a given inning for example or be pulled in the middle of an inning because of injury potential in that athlete."

Athlete Management Systems accumulate data from various sources such as GPS monitoring, sleep cycles, wellness scores and nutritional data to help coaches, sports science experts and physical therapists to make the most informed decisions in relation to an athlete's training, gameplay or rehabilitation.

Precision Sports Technology are developing a software system to collect accurate and reliable data on athletes' movement patterns to allow fitness and healthcare professionals to know exactly how well their clients are moving, without the need for manual video analysis. A coach could be notified if there has been a regression in their movement pattern and showing them exactly when, where and what happened. This will enable them to save up to thirty hours per week on manual video analysis, and allow them to significantly scale their role and deliver a better quality of service.

The data collected from movement analysis in the gym could be accumulated in the Athlete Management System, giving the coach a complete overview on the physical condition of their athlete, which can be as granular as necessary.

A key concern that is noted in the documentary is that around data: athletes' privacy and ethics should be at the core of any data decisions that are made. Precision Sports Technology are building in privacy and security from the very start. Not only to keep in line with GDPR regulations, but to ensure that there is always transparency between the party that owns the data that that who manages the data.

Are you excited about the future of sports? We certainly are! Be sure to keep an eye out as we launch for trials later in 2022. If you would like to participate, please be sure to register here.