The UCI has accepted Nix Biosenors hydration monitoring know-how for race-day use. Beginning within the 2025 season, groups can combine Nix’s real-time hydration knowledge into their fueling methods through the race. Will this assist riders keep on prime of their hydration wants, or is it including extra gadgetry to an athlete already overwhelmed by numbers?
What Are Nix Biosensors and What Do They Do?
The Nix Biosensor offers real-time suggestions on fluid loss and electrolyte ranges by means of a light-weight, skin-mounted sensor. The sensor doesn’t pierce the pores and skin like a CGM (steady glucose monitor) however takes fixed sweat samples from the topic. Knowledge collected from the hassle is distributed to the Nix Professional app, the place coaches or athletes can monitor their hydration standing. Coaches can do that throughout the crew on a centralized dashboard in real-time, say in a major occasion.
Alerts set off as athletes method vital thresholds, permitting for in-the-moment interventions that hold dehydration at bay. The patches that work because the barrier between the pores and skin are disposable and can be utilized one time (one journey). The extra vital mind middle of the unit attaches to the disposable sticky piece and collects/distributes the info.
From Coaching to Competitors
Till now, the Nix Biosensor and its Nix Professional app had been restricted to coaching. I’ve used one for myself and the athletes I coach with some success in hydration wants. I see advantages in auditing sweat loss by means of totally different exercise settings and hydration mixes. However now, with UCI’s approval, groups can lastly deploy this device within the chaos of race-day circumstances.
Will it assist?
Sure, however… I see this as a monitoring system that bigger groups will use for very demanding races, the Tour de France, and something the place a DS (Directeur sportif) has the means to speak with their riders. However possibly I’m nonetheless adjusting my sights to see what this may finally turn into.
Athletes are dialed into their hydration wants, however they’ll all the time be higher and extra environment friendly. Particularly when races get so chaotic that they neglect or don’t have the means to devour what they want. Nix and groups like EF Professional Biking really feel there are extra vital advantages.
“At EF Professional Biking, hydration is one in every of our highest priorities for sustaining peak efficiency. Nix stood out for its accuracy and ease of use. We rolled it out throughout our males’s and ladies’s groups, giving us an actual edge in understanding hydration traits for every rider.”
Dr. Kevin Sprouse, EF Professional Biking’s Director of Sports activities Science
We’ll report again as extra data turns into obtainable based mostly on rider suggestions. Within the meantime, take a look at Nix for data and updates.