Sports and Health as Cornerstones of Tourism Development: Case Study of Montenegro

The modern phenomenon of tourism is more focused on specific forms of tourism in which sports and health tourism play a very important role. That fact is not surprising having in mind that they represent interconnected activities that complement each other and give each other completely new dimension. On one side, sports and health represent very important content of tourist offer because of the fact they enable tourists to become active participants in various activities, and on the other side, they represent important driving force for visiting particular destination. The idea of this chapter is to provide a theoretical and practical framework of this issue with a special focus on case study of Montenegro. According to the results of the research that was carried out, the general conclusion is that Montenegro has extremely valuable natural resources and potentials for the development of sports and health tourism, but there are still a lot of challenges that should be faced in the future in order to improve the quality of tourist offer and the level of tourists’ satisfaction as well as to create completely new image of the destination and position it as high-quality sports and health tourist destination on international market.

Application of Basketball Game Models through Sports Technology

The purpose of this chapter is to present the application of basketball game models through sports technology. The chapter contains introduction, terminology, sports technology practices, basketball models through technology, compilation of basketball models in sports technology, and references. In this chapter, there will be other sub-chapters that will be considered in case of depth exploration of the chapter, writing, processing, and modification of data from other authors. We will present realistically the most renowned thinkers and theorists of the field of models and sports technology from which to draw the most practical model of evolution of basketball.

Sports as a Mechanism for Reaching Your Potential: The Relationship between Positive Psychology and Sports

People have been searching for the good life or personal well-being since the ancient Greeks. During this same period, people have been expressing themselves through sport, participating in games of athleticism as a means of discovering who they are and reaching their potential. This chapter examines the relationship between sports and a flourishing life. By examining sports as a mechanism of achieving specific traits of positive psychology associated with flourishing, the researcher is able to determine that sports are a matrix in which human potential can be nourished.

Smart Wearables for Tennis Game Performance Analysis

For monitoring the progress of athletes in various sports and disciplines, several different approaches are nowadays available. Recently, miniature wearables have gained popularity for this task due to being lightweight and typically cheaper than other approaches. They can be positioned on the athlete’s body, or in some cases, the devices are incorporated into sports requisites, like tennis racquet handles, balls, baseball bats, gloves, etc. Their purpose is to monitor the performance of an athlete by gathering essential information during match or training. In this chapter, the focus will be on the different possibilities of tennis game monitoring analysis. A miniature wearable device, which is worn on a player’s wrist during the activity, is going to be presented and described. The smart wearable device monitors athletes’ arm movements with sampling the output of the 6 DOF IMU. Parallel to that, it also gathers biometric information like pulse rate and skin temperature. All the collected information is stored locally on the device during the sports activity. Later, it can be downloaded to a PC and transferred to a cloud-based service, where visualization of the recorded data and more detailed game/training statistics can be performed.

Machine Learning in Wearable Biomedical Systems

Wearable technology has added a whole new dimension in the healthcare system by real-time continuous monitoring of human body physiology. They are used in daily activities and fitness monitoring and have even penetrated in monitoring the health condition of patients suffering from chronic illnesses. There are a lot of research and development activities being pursued to develop more innovative and reliable wearable. This chapter will cover discussions on the design and implementation of wearable devices for different applications such as real-time detection of heart attack, abnormal heart sound, blood pressure monitoring, gait analysis for diabetic foot monitoring. This chapter will also cover how the signals acquired from these prototypes can be used for training machine learning (ML) algorithm to diagnose the condition of the person wearing the device. This chapter discusses the steps involved in (i) hardware design including sensors selection, characterization, signal acquisition, and communication to decision-making subsystem and (ii) the ML algorithm design including feature extraction, feature reduction, training, and testing. This chapter will use the case study of the design of smart insole for diabetic foot monitoring, wearable real-time heart attack detection, and smart-digital stethoscope system to show the steps involved in the development of wearable biomedical systems.

Challenges and Future of Wearable Technology in Human Motor-Skill Learning and Optimization

Learning how to move is a challenging task. Even the most basic motor skill of walking requires years to develop and can quickly deteriorate due to aging and sedentary lifestyles. More specialized skills such as ballet and acrobatic kicks in soccer require “talent” and years of extensive practice to fully master. These practices can easily cause injuries if conducted improperly. 3D motion capture technologies are currently the best way to acquire human motor skill in biomechanical feedback training. Owing to their tremendous promise for a plethora of applications, wearable technologies have garnered great interest in biofeedback training. Using wearable technology, some physical activity parameters can be tracked in real time and a noninvasive way to indicate the physical progress of a trainee. Yet, the application of biomechanical wearables in human motor-skill learning, training, and optimization is still in its infant phase due to the absence of a reliable method. This chapter elaborates challenges faced by developing wearable biomechanical feedback devices and forecasts potential breakthroughs in this area. The overarching goal is to foster interdisciplinary studies on wearable technology to improve how we move.

Sport for Development and Peace: Current Perspectives of Research

Sport for Development and Peace (SDP) is an international movement that began in the 2000s with the Millennium Development Goals (2000–2015) and is currently continuing around the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals 2015–2030, driven by international organizations such as UNESCO. Often located in an international development context, organizations and associations use sport as a vehicle to reach several social and humanitarian missions (e.g., education, social cohesion, health, reintegration, diplomacy, and peace). This chapter presents the origins and objectives of the SDP, but it also looks at current research in the field. Since 2010, studies have significantly increased in the field around four main areas (macrosociological, field explorations, program management and evaluation, and literature reviews). This chapter also provides illustrations of SDP research projects, axis of tensions between practice and theory, and perspectives for future research in the field.