People often try to compare sports and athletes of today to their counterparts from earlier generations, and the comparison is usually disputed. Although some disagreement stems from the impossibility of knowing how different athletes would have fared against each other, much of the uncertainty stems from the influence of modern technology on sports. Advances in technology offer superior training and increased speed, accuracy, agility, and control in today's sports. Furthermore, in addition to its profound effect on the athletes themselves, sports technology has created new methods of coaching, refereeing, viewing, scouting, and assessing sports.

1. Overview
2. How The Game Is Played
1. Equipment
2. Instant Replay
3. Training
4. Coaching
3. How The Game Is Watched
1. Television
2. The Internet
4. The Future of Sports

A Brief History

Many sports historians would agree that aside from timing devices, which are probably the most fundamental technology affecting sports, the first major spark that ignited the sports-tech revolution was the invention of AstroTurfÒ in 1965. This indoor grass substitute allowed baseball and football to be played both indoors, particularly in cities that experienced severe weather, and outdoors, in regions where grass was difficult to grow. Not only did this improve schedule reliability and field conditions, it also called for further technological development to combat some of the disadvantages associated with AstroTurfÒ (such as different types of cleats, and new turf-specific training systems). Since the advent of the television, sports technology has grown immensely. Today, embedded computer chips, distributed networks, the Internet, pattern recognition products, and various software packages - all emerging technologies themselves - are adding to the rapid advancement of modern sports.

Football: A Model For Sports Technology

The NFL is a prime example of a sport that has evolved to make technology an integral and necessary part of the game. On the field, quarterbacks communicate with their coaches through wireless microphone/headphone systems, coaches communicate with office people upstairs through a similar mechanism, and referees and coaches often rely on instant replay to resolve controversial calls. On a management level, scouts use complex statistics software for acquiring and trading for players, and also for informing coaches and team members of opponent player information during games. On a spectator level, television stations and Internet sites use graphic software to create simulated graphics, such as an imaginary first down marker line that appears as if it exists on the field.

These examples only begin to describe the multitude of technologies used in sports. The rest of this paper will describe various technologies of the past, present, and future, which have been or will be used in different sports to enhance the quality of the game.

Technology has revolutionized many aspects of every sport, but on the most basic level, it has influenced the way games are played. Innovative means for training, testing, coaching and refereeing, in addition to high-tech equipment has increased the speed, precision, and strength of athletes in the sports they play. Specific individual sports highlight each of these innovative means.

If one were to rank each professional sport in the United States in terms of numbers of technological innovations, auto racing would be far and away the tech leader. Obviously, auto racing could not exist without technology. History has it that the first technological improvement to come out of auto racing (besides the car itself) was the rear view mirror. While the rear-view mirror may not have taken much time and effort to create, it demonstrates how much a single invention or new technique can single-handedly alter a sport (Ray Harroun, the man credited with introducing the rear-view mirror to auto racing, won the first Indy 500 in 1911).¹

Presently, racecar engineers spend millions of dollars in developing individual cars. Typical cars are equipped with as many as 3 onboard computers which can monitor every rotation of the auto's drive crank, and which can generate up to 128 pages of data per lap.² This data reflects fuel consumption, brake heat and wear, engine conditions, and just about any detail that can be sensed on the vehicle. Race teams will then analyze the data in conjunction with time data and visual information from the race itself to determine trouble spots or strong points for the car. Consequently, information and products borne from auto racing design often wind up in passenger cars.

Hockey equipment is yet another marvel of modern engineering design. Players use special visors tested by astronauts that allow better vision than ever before. New composite stick materials and lighter skate material allow for faster skating and shooting than previously thought possible.³ To combat this, expect future goalie equipment to be lighter and softer so as to allow fewer rebounds, while sufficiently protecting the goalie.

Referees have one of the most difficult jobs in all of sports: They must endure incessant complaints and eternal condemnation for any mistake ever caught on tape. Some recent devices have helped referees. Probably the most well known 'device' is instant replay. Hockey and football in the United States are especially notorious for their use of instant replay, while overseas, cricket also takes advantage of instant replay's benefits. Instant replay has both helped and hurt the games in which it is used. Generally applied, referees can use instant replay to review their own judgements if they choose, or depending on the situation, if one of the teams challenges the referee's call. Nonetheless, while replay has helped clarify some ambiguous situations, it has also slowed the pace of games considerably - which is one reason why its use has diminished in recent years.

In 1999, the NFL introduced a new high quality, digital handheld screen to be used by field referees for instant replay. Previously, instant replay relied on referees sitting in an off-field office with large television monitors, who would then call down to the field refs with their judgement. But this new technology, developed by Scanz Communications, allows for field-level, high-resolution replay within 15 seconds of the actual play. The device comes equipped with 64 MB or RAM, a 5.8GHz wireless communication chip, and can handle 10Mbits/s of data!⁴ This speeds up the replay process by eliminating unnecessary discussion time, while simultaneously improving accuracy of the calls.

A different technology has been developed for cricket. Cricket is similar to baseball in that the game is relatively slow, and players attempt to hit a ball with a piece of wood. However, cricket umpires often have a difficult time telling whether the ball was in fact struck with the wicket (a crucial decision which determines whether a batsman is out or not). A new device monitors sound waves with an oscilloscope, and judges the sound pattern of certain waves to determine whether contact was made. Dubbed the "Snickometer", this device could greatly increase the accuracy and correctness of the calls made.⁴

Some other sports which use referee-aiding equipment are tennis, which uses a laser device to determine service faults too difficult to see with the human eye, track-and-field, in which cameras and timers can judge to the thousandth of a second or a fraction of an inch, and a new soccer development which could use an array of 8 cameras strapped to the goal to determine electronically if a goal was actually scored.⁵

Why are records that are expected to stand the test of time continuously broken? It is unlikely that human evolution is at the breaking point of an exponential curve, so there must be some other explanation. One answer lies in technological advancements that have created improved training methods and better equipment.

Training today includes one element that did not exist just 60 years ago: computers. Software programs help create weekly routines for optimal muscle toning and endurance; other software and hardware programs control machines which can be set to target the specific motion patterns particular to individual sports; and still other machinery is used to build, shape, and engineer player equipment that offers greater strength, speed, and accuracy of motion. One prime examples of this technology is Olympic training.

Olympic athletes endure some of the most rigorous and well-regimented training programs of all athletes. Because many Olympic events rely on pure body strength and technique, improved training methods greatly affect the results of Olympic sport. Two such training techniques have surfaced in rowing and swimming. New boats come equipped with a wired system of transmitters that record and relay each individual rower's movements to a central computer. This allows coaches to determine which rowers may be slightly off rhythm, something impossible to determine from the shore. Similarly, swimmers' every move can be recorded by special underwater video equipment, and can later be examined by the swimmers for flaws or weaknesses.⁶

Perhaps in the 1950s, a professional or college level football coach would have written on his resume, "Extremely loud voice - can be heard over the roar or a jet engine overhead." But today, such qualities are less important on the playing field. Today, every professional football coach, and a majority of college coaches wear headsets to communicate with other team affiliates. These headsets allow communication with the quarterback, other coaches, and sometimes owners or scouts upstairs. Some of these headsets even allow for a conference type conversation, which raises the question of whether entire teams can eventually be wired for light speed communication. Imagine a football game where the quarterback whispers his calls into his embedded helmet microphone instead of enciphering them in the quarterback tongue. Better yet, imagine baseball without its highly developed signing system - players could concentrate more on their immediate task without looking around to get signals from their coaches.

Separate from the networking systems incorporated into the game is electronic scouting and playbook software. Baseball's extensive database and analysis software allows players and managers to know the most up-to-date information about every opposing player, thus virtually dictating pitch patterns or player lineups from the computer printout. Other software programs such as ChalkTalk^TM and Playbook Power Software for football let coaches draw up and store virtual plays for immediate recall.⁷ Such programs allow coaches to manage real-time decisions with the simple click of a button.

Sports are a spectator event as well as a player's game, and a wealth of inventions and innovations have been created due to the fan's desire to watch the game from every possible perspective. Driven by the desire to create the penultimate virtual viewing experience, innovators have used two media - television and the Internet - to make their dreams a reality.

Hockey came to the forefront of the high-tech sports market in 1996 with the development of a puck that glowed on the television screen. It was thought that many potential spectators shunned hockey because it was too difficult to follow the tiny puck zinging around the television screen. So marketers at FOX developed the glowing puck as an attempt to increase NHL viewership on the FOX TV channel. The puck glowed a blue color on the screen during regular play, and then became a red streak, or "comet" when the puck reached speeds upwards of 70 miles per hour. The system even included a speed gauge that measured the exact speed during "comet" motion. To achieve this effect, each official puck was embedded with an infrared enabled circuit that emitted infrared light. The light was detected by sensors placed around the rink. Each sensor would then convert the light into an electrical signal, which was sent to the television production truck, where a computer would add the graphical enhancement to the television broadcast.⁸

The "comet" was one of the first uses of graphically enhanced imaging during play for live television broadcasts, and although it was somewhat short lived (it became more of an annoyance than a help to true hockey fans, and was removed after its first year of use), it opened the door for the vast array of graphically enhanced systems used in pro sports today.

Pro football now uses the first down line - a line parallel to the field's yard lines - that appears to be on the field, but is in fact imaginary. Various other sports, notably soccer, due to its lack of interruptive commercials, use virtual advertising - an imaging system similar to the first down marker, which places virtual advertisements on the field of play. This system relies solely on video images and pattern recognition, rather than embedded circuitry. Both the first down line and virtual advertising were created and patented by Princeton Video Image.⁹

In addition to computer-enhanced graphics, improved camera technology lets us see the game from the player's perspective. Hockey goalies, football players, and baseball catchers and umpires routinely wear helmet cams, which let the fan see the sport close up. Auto racing fans can watch and listen to the driver, and can also watch the breaks heat up through cameras mounted to the body of the cars. These cameras provide unparalleled views of the sporting event.

Have you ever been in say, Iceland, and had the ultimate urge to listen to the Orioles game on a lonely Sunday morning, only to discover that Major League Baseball is not broadcast in Reykjavik? Neither have I, but if that were the case, you could actually listen to the live radio broadcast through the Internet. Or perhaps you would prefer to watch the java simulation of the game, through the Internet. Or maybe you would prefer to call your folks back in Washington D.C., for free, and ask them how the game is going - again over the Internet. Having trouble deciding which one to do? You can do them all at the same time!

The Internet, which has revolutionized just about everything we do, has not abstained from exerting its influence on the way we follow sports. If you're anywhere in the world, you can probably follow your favorite team through continuous Web page updates, live audio feeds, and even live video feeds. In the near future, you will be able to follow an auto race over the Internet by choosing your favorite race team, listening to live audio of each team member, and watching and monitoring the team's car over the Internet.¹⁰ New GPS technologies in auto racing and ESPN's X-Games will track team member location in a race using GPS devices, in addition to monitoring the same variables that team members can monitor during the race.¹¹

In marathons, transmitting chips are placed in the shoes of runners to follow the runners throughout the 26-mile race. Interested viewers can follow the standing of their friends during the race on the Internet, and runners can check their placement and times after the race on the marathon's website. For sports such as boxing and horse racing, gamblers no longer need to attend the event in order to place bets (which may not be the wisest use of technology). Even amateur leagues run their own websites or can sign up with sports-designated websites such as www.hotstat.com. These sites provide team statistics, schedules, and standings, and can be controlled by players, coaches, and administrators with different levels of access. It is nearly impossible to think of a current sport that is not affected by the Internet.

Where will the pro athlete and the sports fanatic be twenty years from now? Imagine a hockey game in which each player can view an LED display on the visor of his helmet that shows the coaches selected power play strategy, and wherein players can communicate with teammates through headsets embedded in their helmets. But why stop there? Players could don smart skates that respond to ice conditions, and Internet channels can let viewers choose which group of players to listen to and watch. In a game like that, penalties for interference could take on an entirely new meaning (perhaps radio-communication interference would be appropriate).

In addition to the enhancement of existing sports, future fans and players may be glued to their multimedia screens watching robots duel in events such as the Robocup and robot battles. In the latest sports-tech craze, engineers have developed intelligent machines capable of hand-to-hand, fight-to-the-death combat. TV channels currently broadcast these robot fights on shows such as Battlebots (Comedy Central, www.battlebots.com) and Battlebots' British counterpart, Robot Wars (www.robotwars.co.uk). The Robocup (The Robot World Cup Soccer Games and Conferences) is an integrated effort to promote artificial intelligence using the platform of a soccer match to address various issues of artificial intelligence.¹²

Few people would disagree that technology will continue to change the face of sports. The issue that remains in dispute is whether sports have been or will be altered for the better or for the worse. Is it really necessary for baseballs, tennis balls, and hockey pucks to travel upwards of a hundred miles per hour on a regular basis? Could sports still be played with frequent mistakes made by the referees? Are golfers today truly better than their elder counterparts, or is their success purely due to better equipment? These questions are up for debate and perhaps no one can definitively determine whether sports have been "improved" by technology. Nonetheless, one thing is certain: The desire to compete and outmaneuver the opponent - an integral aspect of all sports - has helped raise modern technology to unprecedented heights.