Leinster Rugby Partners with Samsung to Offer Training and Well-being Solutions
(SPORTS TECHNOLOGY)
Samsung (News - Alert) is now an official technology partner of Leinster Rugby, one of the professional provincial Irish rugby teams. This month, Samsung Electronics IT joins Mobile Ireland as official technology partner. Not long ago did the team renew their partnership with CityJet for a further three seasons (in October) and agreed to a three-year sponsorship deal with wine company Wolf Blass (in August).
According to Keira Kennedy, the Leinster Rugby commercial manager, the deal has Samsung providing its technology solutions and its line of galaxy products (e.g., Galaxy Gear, an Android (News - Alert)-based smartwatch, Galaxy Note 3, Android smartphone and Galaxy Note 10.1 edition Android tablet device) to the Leinster squad. With Samsung technology as a key partner, she expects the rugby team will benefit from such Android-based mobile devices in helping them to achieve excellence in their sport.
The agreement with Samsung for the regular play and tournament seasons to come has the Leinster team members, from its training academy level on upwards to first team players, makes use of the Samsung Galaxy products to assist in team training productivity; the devices will be utilized to analyze and improve training regimes, Kennedy explained.
Leinster Rugby chief executive Mick Dawson added that such Android-powered mobile computing devices by Samsung are surely going to enhance the team’s performance and efficiencies on a week-to-week basis. For instance, the Samsung's Galaxy Gear, which is a wrist-worn tech device that interacts with Samsung smartphones, includes fitness apps and a heart rate monitor that can be used to examine players’ training levels and scrutinize well-being responses for each individual athlete. The smart watch runs such exclusive Android apps, which act like a notification device and activity tracker, to provide both the wearer and coaching staff with the most up-to-date readings on health and fitness data to ensure the highest possible performance comes from the athletes.
Samsung’s other intuitive technologies like the Galaxy Note 3, for instance, is compatible with the Gear and also provides real benefits in terms of tracking and monitoring health and wellness for players. This particular smartphone can use Samsung’s health-tracking app S Health or TRAINR app, which is also available for the Galaxy Gear, and can serve as personal trainer and collect data on wearer’s physical condition.
The S Health App will also support Samsung’s newest tablet device, the Galaxy Note 10.1; it will allow any of the staff on the Leinster Rugby club to be able to obtain “the real time data required to make tactical decisions during training and game situations,” affirmed Samsung Electronics IT and Mobile Ireland’s general manager Gary Twohig.
What’s more, Twohig added, is that the S Health app offers seamless sharing of the health and fitness content relating to the rugby players coming from any of the Galaxy devices; key staff can assess each team member’s condition whenever and wherever they need, while on the move. Coaches are also given the opportunity to personalize programs for each athlete, if necessary, to ensure they’re fit to play; this is essential not only to make sure that players reach the highest fitness levels but also to reduce the risk of injury in this full-contact sport where they typically wear little or no padding.
Fitness and Sports Technology (FAST) Expo wrapped up just this week and offered a full day of sessions and demos around this very burgeoning topic of wearable, mobile and data technologies for fitness and sports.
Edited by Cassandra Tucker
