A performance analysis of a wireless body-area network monitoring system for professional cycling

It is essential for any highly trained cyclist to optimize his pedalling movement in order to maximize the performance and minimize the risk of injuries. Current techniques rely on bicycle fitting and off-line laboratory measurements. These techniques do not allow the assessment of the kinematics of the cyclist during training and competition, when fatigue may alter the ability of the cyclist to apply forces to the pedals and thus induce maladaptive joint loading. We propose a radically different approach that focuses on determining the actual status of the cyclist’s lower limb segments in real-time and real-life conditions. Our solution is based on body area wireless motion sensor nodes that can collaboratively process the sensory information and provide the cyclists with immediate feedback about their pedalling movement. In this paper, we present a thorough study of the accuracy of our system with respect to the gold standard motion capture system. We measure the knee and ankle angles, which influence the performance as well as the risk of overuse injuries during cycling. The results obtained from a series of experiments with nine subjects show that the motion sensors are within 2.2° to 6.4° from the reference given by the motion capture system, with a correlation coefficient above 0.9. The wireless characteristics of our system, the energy expenditure, possible improvements and usability aspects are further analysed and discussed.