The world of competitive diving demands precision, dedication, and an unyielding commitment to improvement. For the University of Pittsburgh Diving team, pushing the boundaries of performance has always been a priority. Now, thanks to an innovative collaboration, the Panthers are not just pushing boundaries in the pool, but in data analysis and athlete development as well.
The Pitt Cloud Innovation Center (CIC). powered by Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Pitt Diving team are transforming how coaches and athletes track, analyze, and elevate dive performance. This groundbreaking digital solution is streamlining data collection, providing valuable insights, and giving Pitt divers a technological edge.
The Challenge: Manual Data Entry and Performance Analysis
Traditionally, Pitt divers' performance tracking has been a labor-intensive process. Coach Katie Kasprzak, Pitt Diving's head coach since 2017 and an advocate for athlete development, knew there had to be a better solution. She came to the Pitt Cloud Innovation Center with an idea to streamline the data gathering process and make that data actionable.
The Solution: Instant Insights and User-Friendly Interface
Cloud Innovation Center student interns Vincent Niedermayer and Varun Shelke developed the Diving Analytics Platform: a user-friendly web application that is accessible from anywhere, even on a mobile device. Now, instead of hours of manual data input post-practice, Coach Kasprzak can simply upload photos of the divers’ dive logs. Using optical character recognition (OCR) and a sophisticated large language model (LLM), this handwritten information is quickly extracted, structured into usable data (think CSV files), and ready for analysis, saving Coach Kasprzak an estimated 10 hours of time per week.
“We designed a solution that integrates into her existing workflow — she was already taking photos of each dive sheet after every session, then spending hours manually entering that data into spreadsheets,” says CIC student intern Vincent Niedermayer. “Now she can upload all her photos at once, and within seconds the data populates each diver’s profile, with graphs and KPIs that help her deliver optimal feedback to the team.”
The platform includes dynamic performance analysis dashboards that present complex information in an easy-to-understand format. Coaches can quickly review and analyze diver performance over time using these structured datasets and visualizations, which include a calendar view to track session quality and a color-coded system that shows how well a practice session went.
This means coaches can now easily see where divers are excelling and where they might need more focus. The system even includes a comment box for each session to provide context, and the option to manually set session ratings, ensuring the insights are tailored to the nuances of each practice.
The Diving Analytics Platform is designed to work automatically and efficiently. When coaches upload diving score sheets, the system uses AI to read and extract information which removes the need to manually process each file.
Everything is connected through automated triggers: when a file is uploaded, the system immediately begins processing it, tracks the progress, and stores the results where they can be easily accessed. This seamless workflow means diving coaches and athletes get insights quickly without technical complexity getting in the way.
“This serverless-first approach maintains high availability and automatic scaling capabilities while the entire infrastructure is deployed as code using AWS CDK, ensuring reproducible deployments and simplified maintenance across development and production environments,” says CIC student intern Varun Shelke, who worked on the back-end of the project solution.
The Industry: Sports Analytics
While currently focused on diving, this solution has the potential to use AI prompts for different sports or specific actions where coaches or athletes need quick insights from uploaded content. That could be score sheets, video footage, or performance data files.
The Application: Applicability to Other Industries
The solution is designed with flexibility to export data for further analysis and the potential to customize dashboards or charts as needed, empowering individuals from various industries to get the insights they want without heavy developer involvement. This focus on a "serverless" application also minimizes long-term cost of ownership, making it a sustainable solution.
Supporting Artifacts
Explore the code and project specifics on GitHub.
