Nexus
A VR-driven mental training system that adapts to the competitive cycle of combat athletes. It offers personalized, performance-based mental conditioning that provides athletes and coaches with insights to optimize training to achieve better results.
Politecnico di Milano
Type of Work
Strategic Design
UX Design
Role
Solo Project
Timeline
12 Weeks
Sep-Nov 2024
Project Vision
Mental conditioning in combat sports is often treated as optional, despite being a decisive factor in high-level performance. While athletes in these sports rigorously train their bodies, their minds are rarely given the same structured focus. Developed as a thesis, this proposes a direction on how VR technology can lead the change in how combat athletes approach training their minds.
Role
Solo Project
Type of Work
Research & Strategy
UX Design
Business Design
Tools
Adobe Creative Suite | Figma | Procreate | DALL-E
Challenge & Context
Mental conditioning in combat sports is often treated as optional, despite being a decisive factor in high-level performance. While athletes in these sports rigorously train their bodies, their minds are rarely given the same structured focus. Developed as a thesis, this proposes a direction on how technology can influence how combat athletes approach training their minds.
The project began with in-depth desk research, including extensive reading of books, academic literature, and market analysis focused on the growing popularity of combat sports. As athletes increasingly embrace holistic training approaches, mental performance has emerged as a critical component. Emerging technologies such as virtual reality (VR) show strong potential for enhancing cognitive conditioning in combat athletes.
User Research
I conducted interviews with 9 combat athletes including 4 fencers, 3 wrestlers, and 2 boxers. The synthesis of interview insights revealed a systemic gap: Mental performance was treated as an add-on, not an integrated training pillar.
Desintegration of
Emotional and Cognitive
"Both emotional and cognitive preparation is essential for success. However, I feel that training focuses only on one or the other component."
Inconsistent
Scheduling
"I’ll do a session if my coach brings it up, but otherwise I don’t really know when or why to schedule one."
Lack of Training
Personalization
"I don't know where I'm improving mentally or where I need to focus more. The mental training feels often irrelevant."
Sport Psychologists
are Disconnected
“I used to work with the sport psychologist, but I didn't feel like they could understand my sport and cater to my unique performance needs.”
Competitive Analysis
Most mental training tools today focus on general wellness and not sport-specific performance. More sport-specific tools lack personalization, competitive structure, or integration with athletic coaching systems. This gap highlights a strategic opportunity: to design a system that’s performance-centered and expert-integrated.
Problem Framing
This project wasn’t just about designing another app, but it was about seizing a strategic opportunity for a tech company to drive a paradigm shift in the world of sports training. Meta’s established presence in immersive technology makes it perfectly positioned to spearhead the integration of VR into the realm of elite training.
The core challenge became: How might we leverage VR technology to embed mental conditioning into combat athletes' training routines, making it not just an optional addition but an integral part of their development?
Ideation & Selection
To address the How Might We question, I started with a ideation process, capturing a broad range of potential solutions using sticky notes.
Using Miro, I organized these ideas into clusters, identifying key themes such as personalization, adaptability, and seamless integration into the athlete’s training cycle. Through this synthesis, the most promising concept emerged: an adaptive mental training experience that evolves with the fencer’s competitive journey and performance data.
UX Prototyping
With this direction defined, I transitioned into the UX prototyping phase, starting with information architecture to ensure a seamless and intuitive navigation experience for both combat athletes. I then developed wireframes, focusing on the alignment of screens with the mental training journey.
System Mapping
The mental training app is designed to seamlessly integrate into the broader ecosystem of athlete development, bridging digital tools with real-world coaching.
User Experience
To ensure a meaningful and engaging experience, I mapped the user journey across each stage of interaction. The goal was to create a guided and supportive flow through the training to empower the combat athletes to reach better performance.
Design Decisions
Final Outcome
Nexus isn’t just a mental training app, but a strategic direction of how combat athletes train their minds. By embedding cognitive and emotional conditioning into the competitive lifecycle, through the use of VR technology, it enables athletes to train holistically. Mental coaches gain continuous insight, and athletes receive adaptive support that grows with them across the competitive season.
Learnings & Next Steps
This project taught me to approach design as a system-level opportunity. It also revealed assumptions I had not questioned. For example, I initially designed for iOS, but Android is more common globally. I learned it is important to research platform preferences and user behavior across regions. This helps create more inclusive and accessible experiences.
Due to the strategic focus and time limits, I could not iterate as much as I wanted. In the future, I would prioritize user testing to refine interactions. I would also add a style guide to ensure consistency across devices. Working with VR made me see the need for expert collaboration. Partnering with sport psychologists is essential to designing credible and safe mental training. VR offers great potential but requires thoughtful, cross-disciplinary design.