As any high profile sportsperson would know, a lot of time is spent travelling between venues, and in some cases that comes at a cost to an athlete's health and performance.
Global design consultancy Teague have partnered with Nike to develop a customised aircraft designed specifically for travelling high performance athletes.
On its website, Teague says travel methods have been largely ignored when it comes to investment in sports performance compared to gyms, playing surfaces and injury rehabilitation facilities.
Nike and Teague interviewed athletes, sports doctors, coaches and sleep specialists familiar with the process of travelling sports teams.
"What we found is that crowded game schedules and travel by flight is a fact of life for professional athletes, but it's one that comes at a steep price: injuries and suboptimal performance," the design concept documents say.
The key to successful travel for athletes:
- Recovery: Equalising the negative effects of air travel on the mind and body; bringing the training room to the sky through in-flight biometrics and analysis to accelerate injury diagnosis and treatment
- Circulation: Fostering natural mobility by building in equipment which ensures optimal circulation and promotes healing
- Sleep: Designing ideal sleeping conditions for individuals and sleep strategies for entire teams to maximize physical readiness
- Thinking: Creating spaces for key mental activities both before and after games
Recovery areas would include on-board injury diagnosis and treatment. Noise reduction technology and lie-flat beds would be custom designed to support the body of an athlete.
In-built screens would allow for in depth analysis of game play post-match.
The team also designed special airplane toilets to analyse players' waste for signs of illness or dehydration.
Details of each athlete's sleep, wellbeing and hydration would be accessible to team doctors at any time.
So while for most of us the idea of inflight massage is the stuff of dreams, it's just the beginning for the Nike plane.
