Sports Hackdays 2024 – Participants welcome!

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What are the Sports Hackdays?

The Sports Hackdays 2024 is a data hackathon event taking place at the House of Sport in Berne, Switzerland. Its central aim is to develop Switzerland as a major innovation hub in the world of sport by bringing together people from sport, the sports tech industry and academia.

“Together with our key partner Swiss Olympic Association and supported by Swiss University Sports, we strongly believe in the power of rapid prototyping to replace weeks of meetings with two days of action”, says Dr Thomas Wüthrich. Incidentally, he attended the Sports Hackdays in 2021 and was a Challenge Coach in 2022. Now, he is organising the two-day event together with an organising committee of data science students and lecturers, partner organisations and like-minded people. In doing so, the team is continuing a legacy that began and evolved at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts.

“It is our vision that the Sports Hackdays will become a key initiative to win the sports innovation game for Switzerland by driving advances in sports data analytics and fostering a vibrant innovation community”, says Dr Thomas Wüthrich.

The Sport Hackdays are derived from the idea of a hackathon – a neologism made up of the words hack and marathon. It is an event where data-driven software and hardware is developed in cross-functional teams. This often takes place within a 42-hour timeframe – derived from the marathon. So, instead of investing a lot of time and money in conceptual work on how to use existing data, solutions are sought first and possible technologies are developed in an agile manner based on tasks. In this way, the participants are confronted with concrete implementation problems at an early stage.

Watch some video impressions of the Swiss Sport Hackdays 2021.

Let’s increase the success of Swiss sports – Join us!

Join the Sports Hackdays 2024 and work as a team to solve sports data challenges. You will meet experts from academia and industry leaders, and learn first-hand about real-world challenges and opportunities from sports federations, clubs and world-class athletes. An amazing prize awaits the winning team!

SAVE THE DATE:
• Date: 12 & 13 October 2024
• Venue: Haus des Sports, Talgut-Zentrum 27, 3063 Ittigen bei Bern

 

What is a Sports Hackdays Challenge?

A challenge consists of two things: A well-prepared and documented dataset, and a specific sports need for information and/or its presentation. We want you to really demonstrate (“prototype”) what data can do in sport. We offer five carefully selected and prepared challenges for you to choose from. The domain areas include (but are not limited to)
– athlete development,
– team performance analysis,
– fan engagement,
– smart stadium and sustainability,
and technology categories.

“For example, in previous editions we did real-time analytics with Kafka, a video overlay with Vizrt for broadcast – they helped and brought their own super fast computer. We also had a Web3 Challenge with the International Ice Hockey Federation“, says Dr Thomas Wüthrich.

When learning becomes fun and innovative

As a participant, you will have the unique opportunity to expand your network across academia and industry. Gain real-world experience by applying and showcasing your skills – and perhaps a chance for your team’s solution to help sport immediately, as seen in previous editions. You work with like-minded and highly motivated people.

“We even provide an expert coach from academia and/or industry to support you and your ideas. This is a truly valuable opportunity to gain knowledge and practical skills while having fun and complementing classroom learning”, says Dr Thomas Wüthrich.

This is what you need:
– time and attention,
– your expertise in data science, computer science, sports science, sports management
– and any other creative talents.

“We take care of the rest, such as the venue, dedicated computing power and food and drink. If you need to sleep, we have a very reasonable accommodation offer at the Youth Hostel in Berne. In addition to the participants, we are also looking for an organisation committee member from the student body of the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts”, says Dr Thomas Wüthrich.

Interested? Any questions? Get in touch with us!

If you have any questions, please contact Keith Lawless (klawless@sportshackdays.ch) or Martin Rumo (martin.rumo@hslu.ch), who are part of the organising committee.

Contact us: info@sportshackdays.ch
Visit us: www.sportshackdays.ch

Here you can read some of the articles from the Sports Hackdays 2021:

Sports Hackdays 2021 – Challenge: Moneyball goes Football

Data Science: Hackdays Challenge – Data Science Meets Football

Data Science: Hackdays Challenge – Run Against Your Predicted Time

We would like to thank Dr Thomas Wüthrich for sharing these valuable insights.

DATA IS THE RESOURCE OF THE 21ST CENTURY!
REGISTER & JOIN US FOR A FREE ONLINE INFORMATION EVENT:
Monday, 12 August 2024, online, English
Monday, 9 September 2024, online, German