From ‘Sweat’ To ‘Stats’: Governance Of Sports Wearables In India

“In God we trust, all others must bring data”

The quote often attributed to American statistician W. Edwards Deming, serves as a fitting manifesto for professional sports today. Decision making in sports is no longer driven by the gut feeling, intuition, or anecdotal experience of the athlete or coach, but by data-driven analytics and predictive tools.

Entry of wearables has only amplified this trend. Globally, data from sports wearables is often used to determine tactics and strategy, as well as inform recruitment and retention decisions. This naturally makes wearables an important subject of both sports and data governance. It raises important questions around their permissibility in live matches; the collection, processing, storage, and monetization of data; and most importantly, data ownership. In the west, some of these questions, if not all, have been addressed through dedicated data legislation or collective bargaining agreements between governing bodies and athletes. Back in India, while professional teams and athletes are increasingly using sports wearables like WHOOP and Catapult,^[1] the regulatory framework is far from clear.

With the recent enforcement of the National Sports Governance Act 2025^[2] (NSG Act) and the substantive provisions of the Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023^[3] (DPDP Act) soon to come in effect, India has a foundation to build a conducive and robust regulatory framework for the use of wearables in professional sports. It is hence crucial to assess their impact as well as address how stakeholders should prepare for data governance.

Contents

• Wearables in professional sports: Identifying the gaps in India’s sports ecosystem
  • Assessment from the standpoint of sports laws
  • Assessment in relation to data protection
• Practices for effective governance over wearables-driven processing: Action-items for stakeholders
  • For wearable manufacturers and NSFs / sports bodies
  • For athletes