LAS VEGAS — Tons of wearables at International CES promise to help you get better at everything from brushing your teeth to perfecting your golf swing, but the last place we expected someone to toss a sensor was into our socks.
Sensoria’s Fitness Socks are aimed at transforming you into a better, injury-free runner by embedding three sensor pads into the bottom of the sock that track your stride, cadence and speed while you’re running. Coupled with the Sensoria mobile app, runners can now get direct feedback on their running style to correct things like heel striking to help them dominate their next 10k.
The washable socks feature spiked metal cuffs at the top that are used to mount a thin sensor to your ankle that looks like a Nike Fuelband. With six straight hours of battery life, the Sensoria Fitness socks can even be used during a full marathon and provide real-time audio coaching feedback to the runner via Bluetooth LE.
Sensoria told Cult of Mac that cadence and foot impact have the biggest effect on your performance and chance of injury. Heel striking is often regarded as a more efficient running form, but Sensoria says you’ll have a lesser chance of injury to the knee, ankle and lower leg if you run on the balls of your feet.
Your foot-landing technique, pronation and supination are all tracked in the iOS app, giving the most novice of runners access to professional coaching used by track-and-field athletes. There’s also a Sensoria developer kit in the works that could allow your favorite running app to integrate with the socks. For $199 you’ll get one cuff sensor and a pair of smart socks. Additional socks can be purchased in sets of three for $59 when Sensoria launches to the public later this year.
