‘Sports Science’ is a popular buzz-term around league offices across all major sports. Thanks to advancements in medical testing and wearable tech, coaches can now peer deeper into a player’s performance than ever before. In fact, they can look right inside a player’s body and analyze his breathing, heart rate, hydration levels, etc.
Currently there are several platforms which deliver sports science data, but there exists an underlying issue with each of them: none combine every variable of a player’s medical reporting into one single platform. So if you’re a coach, and you want to study your players’ hydration levels in combination with his weight gain/loss and overall wellness, you have to potentially use multiple platforms to access that information.
Until now, that is…
We at RockDaisy decided to address this problem head-on by creating a Sports Science Module, which serves as an ancillary component to our current RockDaisy data reporting and distribution platform. Our module delivers data across all spectrums of scientific analysis, and stores that information in a single place for users to access at-will.
For example, users can store and analyze data on the following metrics:
- Urine Specific Gravity (USG). Players’ urine is tested frequently to measure hydration levels, which can alert coaches to their overall level of fatigue before or after games.
- Weight Specific Stats. Players are weighed twice a day – before and after practice – to see how much weight they lose between sessions. That information can be uploaded into RockDaisy’s Sports Science Module as soon as it is captured by team personnel, while the player is right there on the scale. This allows coaches and team members to instantly access past data, and measure current inputs along historical averages.
- Wellness Questionnaire. Once or twice per week, players fill out what is termed a ‘wellness questionnaire.’ This trove of information is considered highly valuable because it allows players to subjectively rate metrics like their energy level, mood, soreness, how they slept the previous night, etc. This information can then be stored into RockDaisy’s platform and cross-analyzed across other variable inputs.
- 3rd Party Vendor Information. Coaches and Player Personnel often receive data from 3rd party vendors like Catapult and Zebra; companies that place hardware devices onto players’ jerseys which capture their acceleration, heart rate, breathing, etc. The data can then be measured against a player’s positional average, which allows coaches to benchmark a player’s heart rate or acceleration speed and determine if the player’s physiology is performing above or below average for his position (pretty cool stuff!). That information helps keep players healthy and prevent injuries, which of course plays an enormous factor in a team’s success.
As with all RockDaisy products, our Sports Science Module contains a streamlined user interface that makes it easy to navigate. We created this platform specifically for those who aren’t technically inclined, so users can aggregate and refine search criteria or customize their interface without having to rely on the IT Department.
As data analysis grows more sophisticated, trendy terms like ‘Sports Science’ will eventually become mainstream. The more of a jump teams get on data acquisition and visualization, the better positioned they will be when this stuff really takes off in the near future. RockDaisy’s Sports Science Module is a simple and effective way for teams to nab that all-important edge over the competition.