Get to know our embedded engineer: Michiel. He explained to us what he does on a daily basis, how he thinks Swimtraxx One will have a major impact and why he sometimes wears a swimming cap and goggles to work.
Michiel went to Group T to get his degree in industrial sciences. His interest in sport translates from his work into his hobbies as well. Michiel is an avid runner and enjoys long distance runs and even marathons. Apart from running in races he likes to go on few runs with his dogs as well. Time to let him do the talking!
Hi Michiel. To get started, why don’t you tell us what it is you do at Swimtraxx on a daily basis?
I spend most of my time writing the code that runs on our device. Basically, I provide the bridge between the raw data that is gathered by our hardware and feed it to the Algorithms. I also provide the communication between our device and our mobile applications. Apart from that, I also get involved in the hardware design and evaluation process and certain aspects of our apps. This is what makes it fun to work at Swimtraxx, everybody gets to chip in on everything and we work together as a multidisciplinary team to achieve a shared goal.
What made you want to work for Swimtraxx?
One day the company contacted me with the message that they were looking for a talented embedded engineer. When our founder explained his vision for Swimtraxx and we talked a bit about sports technology it was clear to me that it would be an awesome opportunity to work on cool technology with likeminded people. My first actual interview felt more like a conversation about things like performance tracking and training principles than an actual job interview, so I knew right away that I wanted to work here.
The Swimtraxx One is coming out soon. What would you say, from your point of view, makes this device special?
I believe that in general having solid data significantly adds value to your performance analysis. It will give coaches an extra tool to monitor and log the performance of their athletes. I hope that athletes who don’t have access to a coach or that prefer to train alone will now be able train more effectively. Thanks to Swimtraxx One, they now have access to data that just wasn’t available to them.
"Solid data significantly adds value to your performance analysis."
What is it you like doing the most on a project like this?
I really enjoy the “data geek” way of training myself so working on a device like Swimtraxx and helping to build it up from square one with a cool team has been a great experience. You really get a front row seat to what goes in to making a device like this which is way more than what I could imagine
To give us a good look into life at the office. Could you tell us a fun anecdote from the time you have been at Swimtraxx?
We create wearable sports technology. It's quite common that someone in the office is suddenly wearing a swim cap and goggles while making strange head movements. At times, people start running around the building trying to get their heartrate up to test the sensors. Needless to say, this gets some weird looks from other people in the office.