'Big boat' technology helps olympic rowers to success
18 Aug 2008
With the competition now over, so begins the in-depth analysis into how and why Beijing proved to be the most successful Olympic Games for Great Britain and, in the case of some of GB's rowers who helped to stroke the team to the top of their medals table, assistance from an unlikely source in the lead up to the Games played a major part.
In order to achieve bronze medal success, Stephen Rowbotham and Matt Wells put in hundreds of hours of sheer hard work during training, but Rowbotham believes that their success in the men's double scull was also partly down to the technological assistance provided by a UK based software development and maritime solutions company usually associated with real time information technology for the commercial maritime sector.
codeCreation's unlikely alliance with the Olympic rowers followed a chance meeting between the two parties during the build up to the Games in which it became apparent that there was not only a gap between actual training data requirements of the GB rowers and the software solutions available on the market, but also a perfect synergy between the solutions codeCreation develops for the wider maritime environment, and the individual needs of the rowers themselves.
"Unlike current devices that measure boat speed through the water, the training solution that codeCreation have come up with is a revolutionary leap forward because it enabled me to measure actualspeed, live, which can also be stored for later analysis", says Rowbotham.
Fed into a PDA type device that is then mounted on the boat, the software uses GPS to record accurate positional data and then computes various parameters. Stephen and Matt can select the length of training session (metres) and the readings then provide real speed data in sub sessions and full sessions for later analysis.
Rowbotham, who together with Wells also won gold and silver in the 2008 World Cup Series, explains how codeCreation's rowing solution helped improve their training times in the led up to the Beijing Games.
"Without getting too technical, essentially what we are talkingabout here is a system which enables our training to be optimised for boat speed against stroke rate, providing a constant on board read out of our performance and speed. By graphing stroke rate against recorded speed both Matt and myself can see the true effect of any increase or decrease of stroke rate on actual boat speed, and most importantly what effect any changes have on crucial 500 metre split times."
"Once a training session distance is set and under way, all data is auto-saved for later analysis and once connected to a laptop all the session data can be retrieved. We can even see where we travelled byviewing the saved route in Google Earth!"
Paul Singer, codeCreation's business development manager was notsurprised by the potential for the company’s solutions across other markets.
"We are more used to supplying real time passenger and tracking technology software for big clients like London River Services (part of Transport for London) rather than Olympic rowers," Singer admits. "However, we are constantly innovating as proved by our work for London River Services, which has already yielded added value spin offs such as smart ticketing, on-board wi-fi access, and location aware information streamed to vessels or destination points. It is this high degree of flexibility that allows us to provide solutionsto problems for clients operating anything from large passenger vessels right down to just two men in a boat.
"Like everyone else in Britain, we were immensely proud of the rower's achievements in Beijing. We are currently working on the next generation of this technology and we will be developing the relationship further with Stephen, Matt and the GB rowing team", Singer concludes.
"We are already on track to roll out similar solutions for other sports such as sailing in the run up to London 2012 and this kind of technological assistance helps the athletes stay ahead of the competition, and perhaps win even more medals in four years time!"