FC Utrecht’s hopes of securing a spot in the Europa League have been boosted thanks to their new performance partnership with leading sports technology company, Kitman Labs.

The Dutch football team added the award winning performance solution to optimise the health and performance of their players and help the team remain consistently competitive leading into the final rounds before the Europa play-offs. FC Utrecht use Kitman Labs to centralise health, wellness, training, GPS and game data into one singular view. This helps performance and technical staff take a truly player-centric approach to performance that is underpinned by real, objective insights.

Head of Performance for FC Utrecht, Jeroen Peters, believes their new player-centric approach has already improved communication between the technical and performance departments, enhancing both day-to-day decision making and long-term performance planning.

“In a high pressure, out-come driven environment like elite football, there is always a risk of emotions impacting your decisions,” said Peters. “Kitman Labs reduces this risk, and helps us to make decisions by combining the objective insights from the system with our own experience. Having the information immediately available has already improved our line of communication, keeping the team aligned and focused on achieving long-term performance objectives.”  

“If you want to compete at the highest level, you need to be able to push players to be better – and if you can do this by using insights from your own data, well that’s the biggest advantage there is,” Said Peters. “Now with Kitman Labs we are using our own data  to make better decisions on a daily basis.”

This sentiment was echoed by Kitman Labs CEO and Founder Stephen Smith:

“It’s exciting to see FC Utrecht implement Kitman Labs to enhance their player-centric approach through centralising their information, and then harness the data-driven insights from the platform to further align and focus all staff on their performance objectives. We are honoured to partner with such a forward thinking organisations like FC Utrecht.”

The Kitman Labs solution helps teams to link performance data, medical records, workload, and recovery, produce real-time actionable insights and build confidence in player training and development decisions. With Kitman Labs, teams move faster, work together with a player-centric view that can directly impact the success of their team and lead to consistent performance.

Besides the benefits of the performance solution, Peters also speaks highly of the technology company’s services, which are managed by a team of specialised performance and applied sports scientists.

“The support Kitman Labs offers makes it very different to other companies; they are truly invested in our team’s success and ensuring our experience with their product is a positive one. You can just tell that creating good relationships is important to them.”

ABOUT KITMAN LABS

Kitman Labs is the leader in performance optimization solutions for elite sports teams. Founded in 2012 with the vision to fundamentally change how the sports industry uses data to increase athlete availability and on-field success, Kitman Labs has consistently set the standard for performance and injury analytics. With over 200 years of performance, medical sports science, and data science expertise, Kitman Labs delivers immediate and ongoing performance and business results. Kitman Labs powers over 150 elite teams across the NFL, NHL, MLB, UFC, NCAA, English Premier League, Bundesliga, Pro14, Premiership Rugby, NRL, Japan Top LeagueChinese Super League and more. The company has offices in Silicon Valley, Dublin, Ireland and Sydney, Australia. The company was recently named Performance Solution of the year by BT Sports and to Fast Company’s list of 2019 Most Innovative Companies.