The race was held in the desert starting from Sealine region and ending in Al Jamiliyah town and had a time limit of 96 hours. Every 10 kilometres there was a check point that included referees, medics and water supplies and every 50 Kilometres m a main camp to provide athletes with replacements and rest areas.
For the first time ever, all athletes were monitored thanks to the joint effort of Aspire Foundation (AZF) and Ooredoo, by providing an app that tracked automatically all the runners, specifying their exact position, their speed, their heart rate and other vitals. The app also offered the possibility to send automatically an ambulance in case the vitals of a runner were detected to be reaching dangerous levels.
Athletes had also the possibility to request for support of any kind (medical assistance, water etc). A fleet of ambulances and water supply vehicles were constantly moving along the track and, thanks to the GPS constantly updated of each athlete, they were able to get to the exact location of the runner in no time to provide assistance.
The organising committee CEO, Azzam Abdulaziz al-Mannai said, “The technology support extended by Aspire Zone Foundation and Ooredoo has played a significant role in the success of this year’s Samla Race and we thank both organizations for their relentless support. With the help of the Samla Race App and the Command Center support solutions, the organising committee members in co-ordination with the emergency support team were able to ensure that any health risks to the participants were avoided by closely monitoring their heart rate and location in real time and appropriate response measures taken in timely manner as required, as he also emphasised on the the security and safety of the contestants as a top priority.”
The App fully developed in-house by Aspire Zone Foundation IT Team showcased Qatar’s ability to deploy world class technology solutions for Sports and was an extension of the technical capabilities being utilised in Aspire Academy, member organisation of AZF, for Athlete Performance monitoring and analysis.
Mohammed Khalifa al-Suwaidi, the CEO of Aspire Zone Foundation said “We are excited to see AZF’s technical capabilities being extended to support such sporting events in the country as our commitment to become the reference for sports excellence world-wide and as a testimony to the emergence of Qatar as a Sporting Nation.”
Talking about the partnership Waleed al-Sayed, Chief Executive Officer, Ooredoo Qatar: “Ooredoo worked hard to provide the most reliable and strongest network possible, to help keep participants safe and connect them to the services they need in real-time. Once again, we’ve demonstrated that we have the best solutions and network to help connect Qatar’s sporting events and we hope to work with Aspire Zone Foundation again to develop more innovative technology to aid sports in Qatar.”