Can AI stand as an individual trainer? Fitness company Peloton thinks so

Anyone who has ever gone to the gym knows that a little form improves a long way: maybe your squat is not deep enough, your weight is not enough or your push-up form is weak.

Usually, a personal trainer will help you. But the fitness tool company Peloton is proposing something different: an AI-operated camera that detects your movements and gives you real-time reactions when you work out.

In an interview with CBC News, Peloton’s Chief Product Officer Nick Caldwell said, “This is like being an AI-operated individual trainer in his home for a fraction of the price.”

This is AI, although it is not quite an avatar-Peloton IQ added a Siri-like voice with on-screen signals.

The company is the latest to include artificial intelligence in its fitness equipment. While industry experts and fitness trainers take care that technology has its limitations, they see it as a potential supplement – rather than a lump sum replacement – for traditional individual trainers.

“I think any fitness company that wants to be around the past, says Christmas is definitely thinking how to integrate AI in his offerings,” said Natalia Mehlman Mehlman Petrejella, a history professor of New School, who has researched the fitness industry.

Celebrity instructor vs AI instructor

Pelotons, known for their stable bikes and instructor-led online workouts, were made public in 2019-a few months before the craze of the Kovid-19 Pandemic-era for gym devices, a few months before the craze of the pandemic-era, helped cruges it into the upper areas of the fitness industry royalty.

Ultra-luxury trainers of the company developed like a creed, which became an “incredible asset”, with several riders “having a passful relationship”, Petrejella said, referring to a unilateral relationship with a celebrity.

As more people exercised at home, the company’s stock reached $ 162 US per share in 2020. But once the emergency lockdown ended and the gym opened its doors, its value fell. The stock now sells for about $ 9 US.

Following Peloton’s popularity, some trainers also naked their own attractive sponsorship deals with companies such as Adidas and Lululemon – they probably became expensive to keep Peloton, Petrazella said.

However, “This would commit suicide to change the trainers with AI bots, even if they can move them or see them just like them,” he said.

Listen How Peloton trainers developed like a creed:

While Peloton will use data from existing trainers of the company to train AI, Caldwell says that this tool will “guide users” for trainers who can be a good fit for them.

The goal consumers are not tempted to get their morning run or their gym session out: “We are not trying to work on everyone’s home on additional-transit running machines,” he said.

“But we know that this is going to be an important part of many people’s fitness, because the convenience and the ability to have equipment in your home.”

Can AI change your trainer? Probably not, the instructor says

When it comes to fitness and artificial intelligence, Peloton is a company.

Carroll stationery bikes use AI to make individual workouts; The company uses Magic AI-operated mirror technology to correct the form and count the representative; The speed uses “AI coaches” to suggest gym monster adjustment; And the equipment company Tonal has integrated AI into its weightlifting machine.

“It is a huge financial reverse for technology companies to get into the fitness industry because many of them are already developing this technique,” Petrazella said, “Petrayzella said that the weedable equipment is already popular in the athletic world.

But not everyone in the fitness industry is running away to adopt the latest technology. Personal trainer Carlo Celloti keeps it simple in the co-owner gym in Toronto.

“If it is iron and it is heavy, we probably will use it. It’s like our style. Because at the end of the day, you don’t really need more than this,” he told CBC News.

When it comes to using artificial intelligence for exercise, Celloti said that he welcomes any tool that encourages people to stay active and active – but AI cannot re -create the experience of working with a trainer, he says.

“There is a time when we are using oral signs to correct someone. It may not be working with some people and we have to use touch signals. It is going to be difficult to do something for AI to do something that we can do,” Selloti said.

For example, he is not worried about taking AI away from his business. Many of those customers come to the gym for communal experience – which was particularly clear after the lockdown ended, he said.

“It is making a difficult effort among other people who are doing so. There is something about this that brings people together.”