Incus Nova 2

Ever wondered what the pro triathlete’s HR or power levels are at any point during a race?

Incus Nova 2.0 claims to solve that with the recording and real-time broadcasting of each athlete’s race physiology metrics and position. To take it one step further, and probably make it easier to get some VC funding, Incus also introduce a metaverse-based ‘Mixed Reality’ view where multiple athletes would appear together digitally as they simultaneously race together in the real world.

The brand claims to support HR, power & other metrics over a 5G cellular connection and aims to release in 2023 ahead of the triathlon season.

The new Incus Nova is in the same format as the original Nova 1.0, which is a pod with no display that slips into Incus’ custom clothing.

Thoughts

I was somewhat sceptical of the original Incus 1.0 which also required the brand’s apparel but only delivered motion-based metrics to a computer/watch for each of the triathlon sports. OK, so it also worked for swimmers but this was essentially a glorified Stryd or Runscribe with a significant cost overhead. It’s developed by a team at Loughborough University (one of the UK’s preeminent Sports Universities), so I’m sure it was technically great and that some serious athletes will have used it in anger (IIRC, Alistair Brownlee is an investor).

*IF* the pros agree to live-broadcast their stats then I’m definitely interested in seeing what incus 2.0 delivers. Perhaps my interest will extend to watching a couple of races before tiring. Let’s face it, triathlon isn’t exactly the world’s greatest spectator sport and audience levels are limited. Sure this product might up the excitement level a tad but  I’m not sure that the money is there to make this anything but a peripheral novelty.

I think the real interest for this kind of concept lies with Garmin, if only they could broadcast richer data than what they currently support with Live Tracking & Live Event Sharing text which sends limited info to friends and family via text messages. Once again, Garmin’s lack of full LTE support lets them down.