The Next Generation Performance Tracker, What You Didn’t Realize a Smartwatch Could Do
They promised us the ultimate fitness app, and we got step counts. The ads for Fitbit and the Apple Watch display product aspirations not features. These wearable activity trackers are ideal for running and cycling, but contrary to what the videos suggest, Fitbit does not have any performance metrics related to lifting weights, rugby, or soccer, and the Apple Watch does not track rowing performance.
The most popular wearables in the world have very little software designed for athletes. But, it’s not a technology problem.
It is possible to track sport specific metrics, and there are a handful of companies already selling hardware devices for around $100 per device to track specific performance metrics for sports like weight lifting (Atlas Wearables), tennis (Babolat, Sony, Zepp), swimming (Garmin, Moov), rock climbing (Whipper), kite surfing (Woo, Xensr), boxing (Hykso), and more. These products are amazing, and they demonstrate the early possibilities for sport specific performance metrics.
The next generation of performance trackers will appear as smartwatch apps. After false promises from previous experiences with wearables, most people want to verify that a product actually does what is says it does before they purchase it. This desire makes a freemium app more appealing. More over, we don’t want to pay for (or remember to charge) multiple devices. And, smartwatches are simply the most advanced wearable to date. For example, none of the previously listed products have a microphone or the technology to transform speech to text. Performance tracking on smartwatches is a simple case of more for less, and with 12 million Apple Watches and 3 million Android Wear devices on the market (source: Strategy Analytics), it’s about time for a killer smartwatch app.
We started Proprio Labs to bring tailored sensor analytics and real athletic performance tracking to smartwatches. Our goal is to provide more value to athletes at a cheaper price than current products on the market. Just three weeks ago, we launched our first product, Tennis Sense, for Android Wear. Like the other tennis performance trackers on the market, it tracks your forehands, backhands, serves, and rallies. Unlike the other devices, Tennis Sense is free to download and it also tracks the score of your match using the smartwatch’s built-in microphone. The score provides an important dimension from which to analyze your game, and it can help you identify statistical patterns in points won and lost.
Here’s how Tennis Sense works: download and install the app, put your Android Wear on the hand with which you play tennis, and hit play. You can check your progress in real-time to verify that we are classifying your strokes and score correctly, but you don’t need to interact with the watch. In fact, it’s intentionally designed to be out of your way, so you can focus on your game. Once you’ve finished, just click end on your phone. Then you can go check out your match stats and click into visualizations for that particular match. Or you can check out your user profile and see your all time stats.
We’re just getting started, adding more features, and adapting the app for more sports. If you’re a tennis player, download Tennis Sense today, get feedback on your performance, and start exploring insights on how to improve your game. If you’re passionate about other sports, stay tuned!
All the best,
Matt Groh, Co-founder and CEO
