To eliminate the distance between Gabriel Medina and his coach during practice, Samsung created the Galaxy Surfboard. Made by shaper Johnny Cabianca, the person responsible for developing the boards of world champion Gabriel Medina, the Galaxy Surfboard has a Samsung smartphone as its technological heart, allowing Gabriel Medina to receive instructions in real time from his coach while practicing in the open sea, helping to maximize his performance. The messages received are displayed on a high-frequency LED screen built into the board, allowing Medina to receive feedback from his coach in real time during practice. Thus helping to increase his performance and motivation without having to return to shore.
The Samsung Galaxy Surfboard has been modified to include two sealed waterproof side drawers; one to hold a Samsung Galaxy S7 smartphone, the other to house batteries. Once the surfer is on the waves, two PCB micro controllers inside the surfboard, receive information from the smartphone and show it in real time on an LED display constructed and installed on the surfboard deck. Coach’s tweets tagged with a predefined hashtag appear for five seconds each, and information about the waves, winds and swell appear as graphics beneath the motivational messages. The data about beach conditions comes directly from an exclusive app: allowing a surfer to select the continent, country and beach, and then gives real-time forecasts to help the athlete catch that next great wave.