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TaylorMade's new putter can analyze your golf stroke
Blast Motion is known for making sports sensors aimed at improving your golf, baseball or softball performance and now they've teamed up with TaylorMade on a putter that can analyze your putting strokes. The Spider Interactive Powered by Blast putter marries TaylorMade's most popular putter with Blast Motion's motion capture sensors and can measure and report your backstroke time, forward stroke time, tempo, impact stroke speed and face rotation. With the accompanying app, users will be able to track their progress, access training modules and view videos of their strokes.
Court rules Zepp has to stop selling its baseball and softball sensors
Zepp Labs' sensors let you analyze your performance across a number of sports, including baseball, softball, golf, tennis and soccer. But some of its performance-tracking products will soon be no more. In 2015, Blast Motion, a company that makes similar products, sued Zepp for patent infringement and today the two companies announce that they've reached a settlement.
Zepp's tennis sensor now includes a highlight camera
Unless you've got a professional coach on hand, it can be tricky to determine how good your tennis skills really are -- simply not slamming the ball into the net doesn't count, unfortunately. But for those looking to up their game, sport sensor creator Zepp has a new gadget that could help you serve your best match yet. The Tennis 2 Swing and Match Analyzer, which looks not unlike a tennis ball, fits on the bottom on your racket and measures stroke type, spin, ball speed, ball spin and accuracy, then relays the info to its iOS or Android app via Bluetooth.
Zepp teams up with New Balance to gamify batting practice
In partnership with New Balance, Zepp just gamified its swing sensor and app. As of today, NB HitClub is available on the updated Zepp app and brings along some new features for users taking advantage of its baseball and softball swing assessments.
Zepp phone apps use AI to study your basketball shots
You may know Zepp for sports tracking sensors you can slap on your baseball bat or soccer ball, but its latest tracking involves little more than your phone and a good view of the action. Its game recording and training apps (Android, iOS) are adding a dash of AI technology (namely, computer vision) to analyze your baseball swings, golf swings and basketball shots. If your three-pointer throwing needs work, you just need to point your phone's camera at the court and start capturing. You can share the videos and performance data with others, too, in case you need to prove your skills to recruiters.
Zepp's latest sports training sensor is for soccer players
Zepp started making training sensors for baseball, softball, golf and tennis in 2013. Now, with a few years of experience under its belt, the startup is ready to break into the world's most popular sport, soccer (aka football). Today, Zepp announced a new sensor that lets players track valuable stats from the pitch, such as distance covered, total number of ball kicks and how much time they ran, sprinted or walked throughout a game.
The best tech for college athletes
Look, there's clearly more to college life than studying and partying. There's also sports! Before you hit the field, gym, rink or court it's probably worth taking stock of how you can improve your game with a little help from modern technology. An Apple Watch or Vivosmart can count steps and track your gym sessions, while Polo makes a smart shirt that offers seriously in depth data about your body's performance. There's also sensors that can help you do things like improve your swing in golf or baseball. And, of course, after a long day of training, there's nothing better than unwinding by watching your hometown team make a run at the World Series on MLB.tv. Oh, and don't forget to check out the rest of Engadget's back-to-school guide here.
Zepp's redesigned sport sensor tracks your swing more accurately
For Zepp Labs, a young startup from Los Gatos, California, the goal with its first multi-sport sensor was clear from the beginning: To help baseball, golf and tennis players improve their game. Now, more than two years after the introduction of that product, the second-generation Zepp has arrived. At its core, the new swing-analyzing gadget remains nearly the same, but there are notable developments both on the inside and outside.
Zepp and Old Hickory debut bat with integrated swing sensor
Zepp tipped its hand on integrated swing sensors for baseball bats and tennis rackets back at CES. With MLB Spring Training in full swing, now's as good a time as any to pull the wraps of the finished version. The sports-tracking company teamed up with wood bat manufacturer Old Hickory for the Mike Trout Old Hickory Smart Bat. If you're unfamiliar, Mr. Trout is one of the best hitters in Major League Baseball over the last few years and a long-time fan (since high school) of Old Hickory's sticks.
Zepp wants rackets and bats to pack integrated sensors
Now that any athlete (or wannabe) can measure their baseball, tennis and golf swings with standalone sensors, Zepp figures that the next step is putting them directly into the sports equipment. The company announced that it's working with several equipment manufacturers to integrate its sensor and cloud tech directly into baseball bats, tennis and badminton rackets, cricket bats, glove gloves and other products. It also wants to partner with companies and sports' governing bodies to develop open-source sensor standards for both professional and amateur athletes.
On the court with the promising Qlipp tennis sensor
It wasn't long ago that we rounded up a collection of gadgets aimed at tennis players -- everything from fitness trackers to sensor-laden rackets. But this is still a young market and we've seen several new entries since then. Equipment maker Babolat announced the Pop, a stat-tracking sensor housed in a wristband, back in August. Meanwhile, a new name is entering this growing field. A small team called 9 Degrees Freedom successfully crowdfunded the Qlipp -- a small sensor going for $99 in pre-release deals before jumping to its regular $129 price. It's a "universal" device that should work with nearly any racket and the company boldly claims it's the "ultimate tennis performance sensor." I received a pre-release version several weeks ago and, thanks to a nagging foot injury, I ended up spending far longer with the device than I anticipated. That added time gave me the chance to watch the accompanying app evolve as the Qlipp neared its December release and while the typical crowdfunding growing pains are evident, I do like where the company's going with this device.
Zepp upgrades its tennis game with a beefed-up app
Just in time for the French Open, sports-tracking firm Zepp is launching a big update to its tennis app. The simply named Tennis 2.0 app works with the company's multisport sensor -- a bright, little widget that attaches to golf clubs, baseball bats and tennis rackets. We've taken a few swings with the sensor in batting cages and on tennis courts in the past, and while we praised its ease of use and the fact that it worked with most any bat/racket, we thought the accompanying tennis app lacked the depth of competing options like Babolat's Play series or Sony's Smart Tennis Sensor. Now, Zepp's significantly beefed-up app looks to address many of those concerns.
Zepp's tennis and golf swing sensor arrives in UK stores for £130
Zepp's 3D motion sensor has been analysing tennis swings and improving golf games in the US for the past year, and now it's arrived in the UK to tell us how bad we are at sports. The small Bluetooth-equipped sensor clings to the bottom of your tennis racquet, or attaches to your golf glove, and sends all kinds of data about your wild swings to companion Android and iOS apps. The info it records is tailored to whichever sport you're playing -- not that the links are particularly welcoming this time of year -- with the idea that insight into your game will help improve it. The golf app is especially geared towards lowering your handicap, with various training resources and a feature that lets you compare your swing to those of professionals. Both the golf and tennis versions are now available at Apple, Curry's, PC World, Argos and John Lewis stores for £130 a piece.
Zepp's sports sensor is getting a boost from pro athletes
The tiny data-analyzing, multi-sport sensor from Zepp is about to get even better. Today, the company founded by former Apple product manager Jason Fass announced that the Zepp Baseball and Zepp Golf apps are adding support for video. Not only will you be able to use your iOS or Android device's camera to capture your swings, but you'll be able to compare them with those from professional athletes. To make that process smoother, the Zepp sensor will trigger each recording remotely, by way of Bluetooth, based on every time you take a swing. Once your swings are recorded and ready to go, you can put them side by side against pros such as David "Big Papi" Ortiz, Mike Trout, Jennie Finch and, on the golf side, Keggan Bradley and Brendan Steele. As of right now, there is content from 12 total athletes, and Zepp tells us more are expected to be added in a few weeks. Even if you don't have the sensor, the apps are still a free download -- so it's a win-win situation for you.
IRL: a tennis sensor you can use with any racquet
When I tested Babolat's Play Pure Drive connected tennis racquet, I found the resulting data insightful, but thought the platform was hampered by being tied to a single, albeit popular, model. Zepp's tennis sensor, though, can be swapped from racquet to racquet, so I thought I'd slap it on my current stick and see if it could quantify my averageness.
Could one of these gadgets upgrade your golf game?
With golf season in mid-swing, is your handicap going down, or just your morale? If it's the latter, a few extra lessons might be in order. Given that I write for Engadget (and not Golf Digest) I can't school you, but I can help you with some technology tips. There's a glut of golf devices designed to help you score better, and I tested swing sensors from Zepp Golf and 3Bays, along with the presidentially-approved Game Golf shot-tracking system. For good measure, I also tried a Pebble watch with the Golf Pad GPS and scoring system -- and even a pair of shoes from Ogio, better known for laptop bags. So, how'd it go? Pretty good, actually -- you'll probably still want those lessons, but these gadgets can get you going in the right direction. Also, and perhaps most importantly, they're kind of fun, too.
Zepp takes a swing at baseball with its tiny data analyzer
As someone who doesn't play baseball often, if ever, I need all the help I can get. But since America's Pastime isn't my first sport of choice to practice, I'm okay admitting how extremely terrible I am at it. For others, however, things might be a little different. Whether it's kids who are just starting to play the game or those who would like to make a career out of it, Zepp Labs, creator of the GolfSense, believes it has made something that can help them along the way. Enter the Zepp baseball swing analyzer, an itty-bitty sensor that attaches to a baseball bat and can be utilized to record a ton of useful information, with the ultimate goal being to use this data to help improve your skills. Zepp also does the same for other sports -- that same sensor works with golf or tennis sessions; you just need a different mounting kit for each.
Zepp's multi-sport sensor arriving November 19th for $150
Most of us flail wildly at a ball without any clue about what happens to it, then wonder why we don't get better. To help out, Zepp's 3D sports motion sensor is designed to put hard numbers to your golf, baseball or tennis swing by showing you (via an iOS or Android app) your swing's speed and contortions. We now know that you'll be able to grab one for $150 from Zepp now, or at Apple and Verizon on November 19th, though personally? We're kind of afraid to see exactly how bad we are.
