Plenty of people love their Apple Watches for the health and fitness tracking data it can provide, no matter if you’re walking, running, hiking or swimming. But did you know the Aussie swim team uses Apple Watches too?
“The Dolphins” are harnessing the power of Apple’s Watch and iPad allowing them to use data like never before. Jess Cornoes from Swimming Australia says “Data is the key ingredient when it comes to designing performance outcomes for our athletes,”
“We have seen increased engagement from athletes wearing Apple Watch, which gives us more data points to inform analysis and make coaching decisions. iPad has become an essential coaching tool because it allows us to access athlete health data and race footage instantly from anywhere.”
The coaching staff use the gadgets to more accurately capture a complete picture of the swimmers overall health and performance. Using custom apps on the iPad, they have the use of data and analysis poolside while training.
Gold Medallist and World Record holder Zac Stubblety-Cook uses the Apple Watch for feedback through the day on his training load “As an elite athlete, it’s important for me to access heart rate and activity data in real time so I can make quick adjustments and avoid overtraining,”
“Being able to accurately measure my heart rate in between sets has been a really valuable data point for me and my coach to understand how well I’m responding to training.”
Aussie para-swimmer Katja Dedekind says the Apple Watch makes tracking performance easier saying “It takes all the guesswork out of training preparation and is far more accurate than inputting data manually. In the lead-up to Birmingham, it played a huge role in my preparation as it allowed the performance team to remotely monitor my health and fitness to ensure I tapered off my training at the optimum time.”
Those poolside iPads are giving Coaches access to analysis of Video footage allowing them to identify stroke counts, breath count, splits and time off the blocks – and in a sport where fractions of a second matter – that’s making a difference.
Jess Cornoes says “Most athletes are visual learners, and it’s incredibly powerful being able to show an athlete what we’re asking them to do while they’re engaged during a training session. Quick decision-making is crucial in the lead-up to big competitions to ensure we are maximising the team’s performance,”
All of this is proving powerful for Swimming Australia, having just achieved some stunning results in the Pool at the Commonwealth Games, and no doubt hoping that pushed through to the next Olympics.
