It is quite common to measure and analyze your run with a watch or smartphone. Now it has also become possible within CrossFit. Two experienced IT people from Aarhus have developed the solution, and their goal is to become the global leader in this new field.
Sports tracking has reached a level where the run has not taken place at all if it has not been uploaded to Strava. Crossfitters, on the other hand, do not have the same opportunity to measure and analyze their training. At least not until now.
The Danish startup Atlon has just launched an app for Apple Watch based on their own software, which makes it simple and automatic to track the routine at the gym.
“We compare ourselves to what Strava is for the running world: We want to be the ones who make it easy to track and measure CrossFit,” Mathias Bak Bertelsen, who is one of the two founders of Atlon, says.
The only thing the user has to do is wear a smartwatch while working out — then the app figures out which exercises are done, how fast they are performed, and whether the training is varied enough.
Why does it not exist already!?
Sports apps like Strava are hugely popular, but a large number of sports have yet to join the tracking wave. But why is that?
“This is also the question that most people ask us when we present the solution — it is quite obvious that it should exist, it’s just hard to do properly. You can’t just use one sensor. The metrics that give the real insights into your training require a lot of data analysis,” Peter Kristensen, co-founder of Atlon, explains.
GPS tracking runners is relatively simple, while it is more cumbersome to measure and analyze sports where the whole body is being used. The two seasoned developers have spent almost two years and created several prototypes to solve the challenge, but with the help of so-called machine learning, they have now created a solution that does the tracking automatically only using an Apple Watch.
A global leader
With its special algorithm for tracking CrossFit, Atlon has a product on the shelf that no one else in the world can boast of. This has secured the young company their first investment to further develop the solution and grow the user base globally.
“We have a strong technology, and our biggest focus right now is to further develop it so that we can continue to offer the best solution. Our ambition is 100 percent to become a global leader in this field — it is all or nothing,” Mathias Bak Bertelsen says.
The app can be downloaded from the Apple Store and is free to use.
About Atlon
Atlon has developed an app for Apple Smartwatch, which makes it possible to automatically track exercises during crossfit training — just as it has been possible for runners and cyclists for years.
The advanced algorithms that make the tracking possible are developed by the startup using Machine Learning.
Atlon is founded by two experienced developers from Aarhus, Denmark in 2020. The founders Mathias Bak Bertelsen and Peter Kristensen both have several years of experience in Uber’s development department.
The app is free and can be found and downloaded at https://atlon.app/
The investment
Atlon has just raised a pre-seed round of a total of DKK 3.5 million which will be used to further develop the technology and attract users to the platform. Atlon has also received an Innofounder grant from the Danish Innovation Fund.
The investment is led by the venture fund Founderment. In addition, four experienced tech people participated in the round: Lasse Espeholt (Research Engineer, Google Brain), Zehan Wang (Founder & CTO of Magic Pony), Kåre Kjelstrøm (CTO of Concordium) and Damon Vestervand (Co-founder & CTO of Acter).
