DR JOHN MORGAN

DIGITAL GYMS
PHOTO: WWW.SHUTTERSTOCK.COM/CODY WHEELER
ARRON
WILLIAMS
LIFE FITNESS:
SPECIAL PROJECTS
rom an operator’s
perspective, I haven’t
F seen any new technology
that’s essential apart from
developments in social media.
In fact, I’d argue the club of the
future is far more likely to be
low-tech and high touch, personal and communal, using existing
social media technology and with consumers bringing in their own
fitness wearables.
New wearable technology will provide highly specifi c insights into
our metabolic health and fi tness, in ways we’ve never been able to
identify before. The ability to look precisely and objectively at what
you’ve been doing while working out will allow us to become a lot
smarter about what works for each individual, and our choices will
be driven by this new frontier: the Internet of You. This represents
a seismic shift in how we add value to our daily lives and wellbeing
through regular exercise and activities to benefi t us 24/7.
The club of the future will probably be the home gym and the
great outdoors, supported by fi tness wearables and freemium
platforms like Befi t, Daily Hit and Fitness Blender, and excellent
free apps like the Johnson & Johnson seven-minute workout.
Williams: “The club of the
future will be the home gym
and the great outdoors”
REYNIR
INDAHL
HEALTH & FITNESS
NORDIC: CHAIR
ur primary aim is to help
members achieve their goals;
O in order to do that, we’d like
to track everything they do, analyse that
data, make something intelligent out of
it and use it in a customer-friendly way.
Our technology strategy is very much
about convenience for the member, so
we’ll incorporate it where it helps the
member – for example, class booking,
entry systems, informing programmes,
providing PT and building relationships.
We’re currently looking at several
options for taking information from
activity trackers to create a virtual
personal training programme: the
PT will design a programme and the
machines will automatically register
what members have done. PTs can then
go into the app and view what members
have completed. We’re not quite there
with the seamless integration, but this
is what we’re aiming for.
It’s important to be deviceindependent,
because consumers want
to have choice about which device they
use. We’re working with major vendors
to achieve this, so we can capture
information from any device and then
serve it back through the interface we’ve
chosen. We already have an app that can
track basic activity, food eaten and that
can take class bookings. Although it’s a
fairly advanced function, we haven’t yet
gone as far as big data: where everything
about what you did yesterday, including
pulse and heart beat, is downloaded.
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Read Health Club Management online at healthclubmanagement.co.uk/digital
November/December 2014 2014 © Cybertrek 2014