At Samsung’s Galaxy Unpacked event, the tech giant announced a new smartwatch designed for those who maintain active lifestyles. The Galaxy Watch Active, an update to the company’s flagship Galaxy Watch smartwatch, adds new fitness tracking features including the ability to monitor blood pressure and stress levels. Samsung also introduced a fitness tracker called the Galaxy Fit.
… now there is a DIY way to keep wounds shut, and it’s scalable to the length of the wound. ZipStitch is a clever invention that requires no expertise to apply, and operates on the same principles as zip-ties
Even though Google said in late 2018 that it wouldn’t be releasing a Google Pixel Watch anytime soon, the company seems to be putting a big focus on making own-brand wearable devices.
According to a new job listing, Google is in the process of looking for a Vice President of Hardware Engineering for Wearables.
Researchers at the University of California, Irvine have developed a wearable, disposable respiration monitor that provides high-fidelity readings on a continuous basis. It’s designed to help children with asthma and cystic fibrosis and others with chronic pulmonary conditions.
The inexpensively produced sensors were created by UCI biomedical engineers using the popular children’s toy Shrinky Dinks, thin sheets of plastic that are painted or drawn on and then shrunk with heat.
Placed in two positions – one between the ninth and 10th ribs and another on the abdomen – the Band-Aid-like devices track the rate and volume of the wearer’s respiration by measuring the local strain on the application areas. The information gleaned could, in the case of asthma, help warn of an oncoming attack.
The Sufferfest, one of the leading training apps for cyclists and triathletes, has announced the establishment of a new Sports Science Division led by world-renowned coach and sports scientist, Neal Henderson. The new division will leverage Henderson’s experience at the highest levels of endurance sports to ‘bring cutting-edge sports science to athletes of all fitness levels’.
”Training apps are only as good as the science behind them,” said David McQuillen, CEO of The Sufferfest. “Neal is recognized as one of the most successful sports scientists in the world. He’s created our workouts and training plans for years and he brought power-profile based training to everyone with our 4DP methodology.
“Now, with the creation of our Sports Science Division, Neal will continue to revolutionise the services, tools, workouts, and plans that makes Sufferfest subscribers faster, stronger and more capable athletes.”
… Speaking on the company’s fourth quarter earnings conference call, Plank outlined how connected fitness is a real part of the business now, becoming an analytics engine to gauge consumer trends and a nice recurring revenue stream. Plank said that connected fitness has gone “from being a place or a thing that’s in the organization to really being a part of the business.”
Since the beginning of the outdoor industry, many companies made gear and apparel without considering recyclability, focusing only on the product’s initial life. But that mindset began changing in the 1990s. Now, some gear manufacturers are thinking about maximizing both the life of the product and creating the product out of recycled and recyclable materials, says Greg Gausewitz, manager of product sustainability at REI. That way, when the product does reach the end of its life, it can be used to make even more products of all kinds—from skateboards to insulation.
Recycled materials don’t rely on the extraction of raw materials, which reduces the environmental impact across a product’s lifecycle, according to Gausewitz. Utilizing recycled materials in gear manufacturing also helps divert those items from landfills, extending the life cycle of the material extracted in the first place.
“Use of recycled materials is one of the more promising trends that we see in the creation of products,” Gausewitz said.
To find out how to deal with extreme temperatures, I called Cathy Geiger, a professor at the University of Delaware (and a fellow Vermonter) who’s been studying the behavior of sea ice at both the arctic and Antarctic poles for more than three decades.
Having worked on 10 polar expeditions, Geiger’s seen … a lot (including some gross frostbite stuff that involves eyelashes; we’ll get to that), and for the sake of clarity, because layering for sub-zero temperatures is pretty complicated, the following information will be distilled via a handy question-and-answer format.
… “Increasing the use of renewable sources of energy is essential to reducing CO2 emissions,” says Robert Swan. By putting these clean energies to the test in Antarctica, the Earth’s harshest wilderness, he describes how they wanted to prove that renewables “can be developed for use anywhere, and, therefore, play a crucial part in helping the planet transition to a lower-carbon future.”
After experiencing first-hand the effects of climate change as an explorer, Robert has been on a 50-year mission to preserve the earth’s southernmost continent by promoting recycling, renewable energy, and sustainability. And his son Barney has now joined him on the journey.
Fiber-based electronics are expected to play a vital role in next-generation wearable electronics. Woven into textiles, they can provide higher durability, comfort, and integrated multi-functionality. A KAIST team has developed a stretchable multi-functional fiber (SMF) that can harvest energy and detect strain, which can be applied to future wearable electronics.
Dr Helen Czerski visited WMG (Warwick Manufacturing Group) at the University of warwick for Fully Charged to understand how batteries work, what they’re made from and how they are developing.
ANTA Sports Products has passed a resolution required in connection with the Mascot Bidco Oy consortium’s offer for all the shares in Amer Sports Corporation.
Mascot Bidco Oy is an investor consortium that is currently aiming to acquire Amer Sports. It is formed by ANTA Sports, FV Fund (FountainVest Partners), Anamered Investments and Tencent Holdings (which will invest through Mount Jiuhua Investment as a limited partner in FV Fund).
… I spoke to Blake Dircksen, a doctor of physical therapy at Bespoke Treatments and creator of Nightcap Training, about the red flags of soreness, why taking a rest isn’t always a good thing, and why you might finally need to book that appointment with a PT you’ve but putting off for months now. Before you test an injury and render yourself incapable of going to the gym at all, look out for these signs.
The moment you step off the treadmill or lower the barbell for the last time, the clock starts ticking. Will you make it back to your locker in time to scarf down your recovery shake or energy bar before it’s too late? Or will you miss out on some of the benefits of your workout by leaving your tired muscles starved of fuel until you get home for dinner?
That stark choice has been drummed into generations of gym-goers since the 1980s thanks to a theory called the “metabolic window of opportunity,” which holds that your muscles are uniquely primed to recover and grow if you feed them immediately after exercise. Miss the window and you’ve missed a chance to get fitter and stronger. Some fitness researchers have even argued that when you eat is more important than what or how much you eat.
But not everyone agrees. In a recent article in the Journal of Orthopaedic & Sports Physical Therapy, prominent sports nutrition researchers Brad Schoenfeld of Lehman College in New York and Alan Aragon of California State University, Northridge, reassess the evidence for the window theory. Postworkout refuelling is certainly important, they conclude – but the emphasis on a narrow window is misplaced.
Over two days in early 2006, British researcher Dr Ian Walker rode his bike up and down a stretch of road in the city of Salisbury, stopping every few minutes to put on or take off a long, feminine wig. He wasn’t doing it for fun — it was part of a study looking at the factors that affect how much space drivers give when overtaking cyclists.
Using an ultrasonic distance sensor mounted to his bike, Walker measured how much space drivers left when passing, when he was wearing the wig and when he wasn’t. In Walker’s own words, “On average motorists left considerably more space when passing the rider when he gave the impression of being female.” While wearing a wig, Walker was given an average of 1.37m of space by overtaking drivers. Without the wig, that average was 1.23m.
Why the extra room? Walker surmised there were a few factors.
CatEye has been announced as a winner of this year’s iF DESIGN AWARD for its CatEye Quick bike computer in the iF DESIGN Product category. Over 6,400 award entries were submitted from 50 countries, which were scrutinised by a 67-member jury made up of independent experts from all over the world.
The jury’s award rewards the design and development of the CatEye Quick – positioned as a simple and stylish cycle computer for urban, design-conscious cyclists.
It has been demonstrated that, on their own, both exercise and stimulation from the environment can improve cognitive function and well-being in older adults. The combined effect of exercising in the outdoor environment on psychological function is less well studied. The aim of the current study was to investigate the effect of an outdoor cycling intervention on cognitive function and mental health and well-being in older adults. A total of 100 older adults took part in the study (aged 50–83), 26 of which were non-cycling controls, 36 were conventional pedal cyclists and 38 were participants using an e-bike (a bike fitted with an electric motor to provide assistance with pedaling), as part of a larger project (www.cycleboom.org). Participants took part in the study for an eight-week period, with cycling participants required to cycle at least three times a week for thirty minutes in duration for each cycle ride. Cognitive function and well-being were measured before and after the intervention period. For executive function, namely inhibition (the Stroop task) and updating (Letter Updating Task), both cycling groups improved in accuracy after the intervention compared to non-cycling control participants. E-bike participants also improved in processing speed (reaction times in go trials of the Stop-It task) after the intervention compared to non-cycling control participants. Finally, e-bike participants improved in their mental health score after the intervention compared to non-cycling controls as measured by the SF-36. This suggests that there may be an impact of exercising in the environment on executive function and mental health. Importantly, we showed a similar (sometimes larger) effect for the e-bike group compared to the pedal cyclists. This suggests that it is not just the physical activity component of cycling that is having an influence. Both pedal cycles and e-bikes can enable increased physical activity and engagement with the outdoor environment with e-bikes potentially providing greater benefits.
… A recent article on Run247 (Feb 2019) discussed the rise of ultra races but also how many runners are competing in back-to-back events, giving little thought to the impact it might be having to their body and long-term health.
Can we really use “how we feel?” post-race as a subjective indicator to understand if our body is ready to race again?
I’m a big fan of monitoring: ask any athlete I have worked with and it’s fundamental to my practise. If you really want to get the most out of someone’s performance, you have to understand how their body is responding to their training load. Only then can you provide them with appropriate nutritional interventions.
Wide-ranging, wily and wary: wolverines come by their tough reputation honestly. And now researchers are seeking for community scientists to better understand this species at risk.
Wolverine Watch is a scientific collaboration of researchers from British Columbia and Alberta. These scientists are asking people who ski, snowshoe, snowmobile or take part in other winter activities in the Canadian Rockies and associated mountain ranges to keep their eyes peeled for signs of wolverines and share what they see.
The Great American Rail-Trail will connect thousands of miles of rail-trail and other multi-use trails across 14 states, spanning from Washington, D.C., to Washington State.
The executive director of an Atlanta, Georgia YMCA is looking forward to this summer with the same level of excitement as a kid anticipating summer break. Tony Kimbrough is dreaming of the day a neighborhood park opens and kids can gather, play, and test their skills on a unique boulder for years to come. The weekend before Martin Luther King Jr. Day in January, a few dozen kids from the YMCA and another nonprofit in the area learned to climb. The North Face athletes Fred Campbell and Manoah Ainuu showed them the moves before the kids were given clay and tracing paper to design their dream climbing wall. Those ideas will be incorporated into a custom boulder for their community.