here’s hardly anything more frustrating for a sports fan than a bad call. Whether it’s a strikeout instead of a walk, obvious travelling or a missed foul, sometimes human eyes aren’t enough to get it right. And while referees take most of the blame, a ‘bad call’ is really a bad play – a fumble instead of a completed pass, a turnover or a missed shot when the goal was left wide open. Tracking technology can minimise these pitfalls. Tracking technology is just what it sounds like: technology that pinpoints the exact position of a player or ball – or that tracks something else entirely, such as physiological data. Utilised for everything from understanding exactly when the puck crossed the goal line to recording an American football player’s rushing yards, this tech has truly become a mainstay of modern sport. Decades ago, tracking technology was primitive; coaches would time plays using stopwatches, watch tapes or write down observations manually. These techniques were useful but limited, as they didn’t offer any real-time feedback and often lacked precision. Eventually, equipment such as GPS trackers and heart-rate monitors came into being – useful tools but potentially distracting to players wearing them. According to Jens Melvang, a senior product manager at Stats Perform, there are two types of tracking technology today: active and passive. “Active means an object with a transponder is put on the player or ball,” he defines. “The signal is captured by an antenna. Passive is non-invasive,” he continues, “meaning there is no physical object on the player or ball being tracked.” He further divides passive tracking into ‘optical’ and ‘laser’, the latter being more expensive and less popular. Optical tracking, however, can be done both in-venue, using a camera that covers the entire pitch, and by
The world of sports is ripe with human error and imperfection. Tracking technology could be the answer Staying on track
Words by Katie Kasperson
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