Meet the sports mad programmer helping to create the brand new Sports Tracker

brand-new-sports-tracker

The brand new Sports Tracker will be arriving soon, making it easier than ever to track your fitness performance and get social with your friends while doing it. Needless to say, we couldn’t have done it without our fantastic team of developers, programmers and coders. Their hard work is what has made the new and improved Sports Tracker possible. Emiliano De Simone is one of nearly a dozen iOS team members who have been working hard to bring the best sports tracking experience to iOS users.

Getting pro at programming

Originally from Rome, Emiliano moved to Finland in 2000 to finish a Master’s thesis in mathematics. Encouraged by his mentor, he decided to stay and pursue a PhD in the same subject. After earning his doctoral degree in 2006, Emiliano decided that a career change was in order. “It’s not easy to find a job for someone with my background, but I realized that programming would be a natural next step for someone with my education,” he says.

Now working at Amer Sports, Sports Tracker’s parent company, Emiliano is loving the daily challenges of creating a sports app that helps fitness fans and sports enthusiasts get in tip top shape. Much of what Emiliano and the rest of the iOS team do is developing, maintaining, and testing the iOS app. For Emiliano, these tasks are interesting and motivating, not least because excellent teamwork makes everything run so smoothly. “Whatever challenge we face on a daily basis, I can always discuss it with my colleagues and we can come up with a common solution,” he enthuses.

An app that’s the perfect fit

emiliano

The comradery on the iOS team isn’t the only motivating factor, of course – Emiliano and the rest of the team truly believe in what they’re creating. “We’re developing a sports product and it’s something that encourages people to live their lives in a better way. I’m very proud of what we’re building here,” he says.

As an avid user of Sports Tracker, Emiliano’s pride in his work doesn’t end with development. “For me personally, working to develop a sports application means I would be an end user of the application. It’s fun to understand what we’re developing from that perspective as well,” he says. Being a user helps Emiliano incorporate the features that are most beneficial, such as bigger and better social sharing. “Because of its social aspect, I am more motivated to use the app. Once you share your workout, you want it to look good compared to your friends’ results,” Emiliano says. “One thing is for sure, working here has made me more fit!”

Get super social!

In addition to the buffed up social features, which will make encouragement from friends a core motivational aspect, the new Sports Tracker for iOS has a lot more to offer. The app will have a fresh new look and feel, a new diary with improved progress analysis, and better workout analysis to make your workouts count more than ever. Fantastic features such as free “On this Route” analysis, a free weekly goal, and a weekly leaderboard to compete with friends are on the way as well. With so many more wonderful ways to work out, we’ve no doubt Emiliano will get even fitter. We hope you will too.

New Sports Tracker is coming soon

22 comments

  1. Issam

    Hi dear sport tracker Team,

    Your application is really good but the only thing that is missing is sport band that can take all the individual activity. But one thing that I don’t like about activity Trackers and that is charging. I hope you can make something that not required charging, like Garmin vivofit. It has one year battery life. But no HR monitor.
    I hope you can make something with HR monitor and has one year battery life that would be great.

    Please you can also reply to me on
    Balushi55@outlook.com

    1. The Sports Tracker Team

      Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Issam. We really appreciate your feedback and are happy to hear you’re loving Sports Tracker. We already have a HR monitor :) Is this what you’re looking for? http://www.suunto.com/en-GB/Products/Heart-Rate-Belts/Sports-Tracker-Smart-Sensor/?cmpid=ST_VIRT_stsmartsensor

  2. Josep

    My congratulations to the team that developed this app. I’m not a big sports fans, and my use of the app is to track my sporadic walks or little running escapes, but I’m using this app since 2011 when it was running on symbian system and it really is very useful with many options and different sports.

    I will add a 3D resume or something more visual to the tracks like wikiloc.

    Thanks

  3. Vassilis

    Good news! I hope that the calories measurements during cycling will be calculated properly. I have spotted many differences compared to other applications and I’m a bit confused which are the right calculations.

    1. Sports Tracker Team

      Hello Vassilis and thanks for the feedback! We’re trying to make the calory measurement as accurate as possible. With a heart rate monitor you will get better results. You can order one from here: http://www.suunto.com/fi-FI/Tuotteet/Sykevyot/Sports-Tracker-Smart-Sensor/?cmpid=ST_VIRT_stsmartsensor.

  4. Robert Dempster

    HI,
    1) Allow me to log out on my (Android) phone and set down the app. Using the app since Oct 2012.
    2) Improve the speed altitude etc graphs by adjusting the scales and bases lines to better accommodate the window in which they appear.
    3) Make it easier to share a data set (map, graphs etc to Facebook my own web site etc.
    4) Allow an active ST user to track down / ride towards another active ST user. Would be great whilst touring and you become separated from your touring partner because you stopped while your partner continued.
    5) Produce a HRM that is easier to use and starts up FASTER. Recently bout a Samsung GearFit2 (did not like), then a TOMTOM Spark 3 (which I like) to get a decent HRM.
    6) REDUCE THE premium RATE FOR FOLK LIVING IN 3RD WORLD COUNTRIES WHERE THE EXCHANGE RATE IS PUNITIVE. Better still charge using the BIG MAC Index!

    1. Sports Tracker Team

      Hi Robert! Thanks for the valuable feedback, we appreciate it! Some of the features you suggested are already under development and hopefully you’ll be able to use them soon.

  5. Richard

    A couple of things. When I stop to take a picture, having to tick it as good really takes time. Also, app takes a long time to find my location, and sometimes am halfway through my run before it kicks in, then delivers an average speed based on time running and distance measured, which looks slow and can be dispiriting.
    Thanks

    1. Sports Tracker Team

      Hi Richard! What device are you using? We can inspect the GPS issue if you can give us this info. You could also communicate your problems to our support, they’ll be able to help you when they get more detailed info from you. You can do it here: http://support.sports-tracker.com/customer/portal/emails/new or straight from the app itself.

  6. Iztok

    When I go hiking, it would be nice to show how much alititde I gain from start to top point and back.

    1. Sports Tracker Team

      Hi Iztok!
      If I understand your question correctly this is information that the app does track and you should be able to see it from the analytics of your workout. Can you see the ascent/descent from there?

  7. Carlo

    Important to make ST a competitive app again are:
    – native Apple Watch app (start training from watch)
    – ability to lap on Apple Watch
    – compatibility with more heart rate trackers, including Apple Watch

    1. Sports Tracker Team

      Hi Carlo and thanks for the feedback! All of these features are planned and hopefully under development soon.

  8. John

    Please make sure all this social media connection is optional and easily ignored. To many apps now require Facebook sign ins. Nothing turns some of us off faster. I love ST!
    Would hate to have to delete just because your 20 something programmers think everyone wants to share.

    1. Dan

      I agree. More analytics is a great thing. I’m happy to have social options available but please don’t let it dominate the app.

      1. Sports Tracker Team

        Hi John and Dan! All of our social features are optional and easily ignorable.

  9. Torstein Hølleland

    Please add free detailed maps in the new free ST. A more detalied map like Open Cycle Map should be free since the map is free.

    1. Sports Tracker Team

      Hi Torstein! Let’s see what we can do about this one. You’re request is noted!

  10. Torstein Hølleland

    I have used ST since my very first Nokia N95, especially for hiking. Now I use it all the time, hiking, bicycling and sometimes even moving my large garden. I have a bluetooth puls belt for accurate pulse recording.
    In addition I use a Polar RCX5 sports-watch. When cycling I usually have a very hard workout (equal to tempo) and I really like to se my average puls per km cycling and I have become very depended on seeing this number.

    That is what I will suggest you should put in to the new ST. When the numbers for the last km comes on screen, please add a number showing my average puls during this km. The average speed should also be more visible and show km/h!
    Thank You

    1. Sports Tracker Team

      These features are coming in the new version Torstein!

  11. Mark

    One reason that I use ST so much is that it allows me to record so many different sporting activities. 3 things that I’d like to see improved:

    1. When starting an activity 3 most frequent are displayed. I’d prefer more – 5.
    2. When adding an activity by hand I’d like the list of possible activities to be the same order as when starting one. I.e. most popular at top followed by the list/rest.
    3. It would be nice when adding activities by hand to be able to attach a map of a previous activity. This isn’t currently possible.

    1. Sports Tracker Team

      Hi Mark and thanks for your feedback! The new version will solve at least the second issue and we’ve noted to other two. We’ll have to see if we can do something for those.

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