Virtual reality and sport: breaking ground on and off the pitch

https://www.theguardian.com/media-network/2016/oct/21/virtual-reality-changing-sport-game-nfl-nba

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You can stay here and you’ll be a great coach. But I think you’re really on to something here. If I were you, I’d put everything I had into this.

At the end of the 2014 college football season, it was graduate assistant coach and former Stanford University kicker Derek Belch who received this advice from head coach David Shaw. Two years later and now CEO at STRIVR (Sports training in virtual reality), Belch is wary of claiming to be the pioneer of virtual reality (VR) in sports training.

“Sometimes I do actually sit back and reflect on what we’ve done the last year and a half, taking it out of the video game realm. Maybe we have pioneered this a little.”

VR is the nearest thing we have today to teleportation

What STRIVR has done is persist with the concept of VR in sports training, idealised by many but never delivered. Belch first proposed the idea to his professor, Jeremy Bailenson, in 2007 when taking a class on VR at Stanford, and six years later he returned to the idea with technology advanced enough to get the cameras rolling. It was the topic of Belch’s master thesis, and over the next two years he and Bailenson designed and developed 360-degree video capturing, followed by processing the footage into a headset for use.

Shaw saw the impact it would have on the future of sports. VR gets you closer. Closer to the practice field, closer to the stadium.

The VR revolution also has an effect for those who are less tech savvy, such as Arizona Cardinals quarterback Carson Palmer, a customer of STRIVR. Standing in his kitchen at home, VR transports him to the practice field. Buffalo Bills quarterback Tyrod Taylor, nine years Palmer’s junior, had the VR equipment in his dorm at training camp in August, using it to accelerate his learning. “Visualisations are key”, Belch says.

From the field to the couch

It can also bring fans closer to the action; NextVR are offering a virtual ticket to premium sporting events all around the world, providing an unparalleled fan experience and access to a sold out event.

“VR at home is a separate but complementary experience to live events. It offers a sense of what it is like to be there, fully immersed in the excitement, and to be a real companion to what is happening at live events,” says Brad Allen, executive chair of NextVR.

“NextVR’s strategic benefit is that the cameras are small enough to be put almost anywhere. We are enabling priceless experiences like standing in the end zone of a football game or in pit row during a Nascar race. The reaction to boxing has been incredible because the experience goes beyond what it is like to watch the same content on a TV broadcast.

“VR is the nearest thing we have today to teleportation.”

EON Sports VR, which has a partnership with Miami University, offer a package that grants the user a year’s worth of VR content – stepping into the locker room, running out of the tunnel into the stadium, practice footage – and a VR headset.

“This is a five-to-10 year outlook on how teams will build content for their fan base. We think the VR landscape will look a lot different next year, and then again in 2018,” says Brendan Reilly, co-founder and chief executive of EON Sports VR. The tech is already being used. At the beginning of last year’s NBA basketball season, the Golden State Warriors broadcast their opening game at the Oracle Arena against the New Orleans Pelicans in VR, and the league will stream a weekly VR game in the 2016/17 season.

Allen says: “Anyone who has access to the Oculus store on a compatible Samsung smartphone and Samsung Gear VR headset can watch NextVR broadcasts live from any location with an internet connection. The experiences are available for free in the various channels on the NextVR app.”

However, for all the talk of incredible and “as-live” experiences offered by this technology, every company in question stresses that there is still nothing like attending an actual live event – which is true, until you consider the price tag between the two.

Belch believes “there will be a day when the live ticket is devalued slightly because of the headset or glasses you could get. But I don’t think it’s going to apply across all sports.” Take gymnastics,” he says. “I can put a camera next to the balance beam, but if someone is running to the horse vault, I need to switch cameras as they run toward it. What about golf? You can’t even see the ball live. NextVR have tested it at the US Open, putting cameras on a tee. Economically they won’t put ten cameras on each hole.”

The production continues on both sides. EON Sports VR are diligently working with Major League Baseball teams, allowing players to step in via headset and face any pitcher they are going to play in the next day or two, with daily data updates and a simulation of the upcoming opponents.

“Thanks to VR, on your first bat of a real game, it’s seemingly the tenth time you have faced them that day,” Reilly says.

Belch explains that in a sample size of 20 football practices, if his team set aside five to 10 minutes after every practice, he could produce a 500-play library for that specific team.

“But we battle time. We battle traditional thinking and attention spans. In the world we live in, panic sets in if we stand around for 10 minutes.”

Future goals

It’s in its early stages, but how might this new tech be received?

“The VR industry has a lot of energy and enthusiasm right now, and between Playstation VR, Oculus Rift, Gear VR and the HTC Vive, things look great,” says Belch. “But we have to see the industry continue to evolve so consumers keep buying it. In sporting terms, we are in the bottom of the first inning. The technology is really cool. But you need legitimate use cases”.

While we know VR isn’t going to replace television, we’re yet to find out if the technology has the staying power to become a ubiquitous form of media.

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