SmartSwim

Wearable system to study swimming


  • Contact person: Mahdi Hamidi Rad
  • People involved: Mahdi Hamidi Rad
  • Partners: CHUV (Prof Vincent Gremeaux), Gait Up (Dr Farzin Dadashi)
  • Funding source: EPFLInnovator fellowship

Wearable system to study swimming

Overview:

As one of the most popular sports in summer Olympic Games, swimming has always been attractive to study for sports scientists. Complicated nature of motions and variety of techniques made coaches use analysis systems. With the advent of wearable sensors, inertial measurement units (IMU) in particular, motion analysis found the chance to study new aspects of motion for in-field applications. Studies on swimming with IMUs mostly focused on detecting individual features, less aimed to use them to swimmers’ benefit. SmartSwim is going to offer useful details and evaluation of swimming in all swimming phases and styles with a more practical approach. The main objective of this project is to develop a package of sensors and algorithms as an assistant for swimming coaches. It helps them with an objective performance evaluation of each swimmer and provides feedback for both coaches and swimmers.

Methods:

Considering the roles a coach plays during a training session, Smartswim will contribute to each part to assist coaches with more efficient training. It broadens their view and understanding of the kinematic features during swimming. It will provide an objective evaluation for each swimmer and assist the coach to diagnose their weak points. Finally, it provides feedback for both coach and swimmer.

Qualitative analysis, Subjective evaluation, Personal learning abilities in Wearable system to study swimming
Figure 1 – SmartSwim general approach. This analysis system will contribute to each role of a swimming coach.