From athlete to innovator – meet the triathlete creating products to improve swimming and strength training

Triathlon is a sport that quickly gets you hooked. But for engineer Johnny Ottema it also sparked ideas that led to him creating his own company. Find out more about Rayofi and its innovations for triathletes.

Sponsored: Rayofi was founded by Dutch engineer and age-group triathlete Johnny Ottema.

Unlike many sports brands, Rayofi did not start with a business plan. It started with a personal challenge.

Five years ago, Johnny entered the world of triathlon. Like many triathletes, he quickly discovered that balancing swimming, cycling, running, work, travel, and family life can be difficult. As an engineer, his instinct was to look for practical solutions to the challenges he encountered during training.

Johnny continues to actively compete in triathlon and uses the products he helped create throughout his own training.

Like many age-group athletes, he faces the same challenges as thousands of other triathletes: limited time, frequent travel, maintaining motivation during long swim sessions and fitting strength training into an already busy schedule.

For Johnny, triathlon is more than a sport. It is a real-world testing ground where new ideas are developed, tested and refined before they become products.

Solving the swimming problem

One of the first challenges Johnny encountered was swimming.

Swimming requires many hours in the pool. While many swimmers enjoy the silence of the water, others would like to listen to music, podcasts or coaching during long training sessions. The challenge is simple: Bluetooth signals do not work underwater.

As an engineer, Johnny started investigating alternative technologies and eventually developed the Rayofi SwimComm system.

Instead of relying on Bluetooth underwater, SwimComm uses a dedicated transmitter and radio technology to send audio from a smartphone to a waterproof bone-conduction headset. This allows swimmers to listen to Spotify, Apple Music, podcasts and coaching instructions while swimming, even several metres underwater.

The system quickly evolved beyond entertainment. SwimComm is now also used by coaches and swim clubs who want to communicate with swimmers in real time during training sessions. Rather than waiting until a swimmer reaches the wall, coaches can provide immediate feedback on pacing, technique and open-water skills while the athlete is still swimming.

For long endurance sessions, many swimmers find that music or coaching feedback helps maintain focus and motivation. Others still prefer the traditional silence of the water. SwimComm simply gives athletes another option.

Today, Rayofi SwimComm helps swimmers make long training sessions more enjoyable while creating new possibilities for coaching and performance improvement.

Rayofi has also recently partnered to offer the new Holoswim 3 PRO smart swimming goggles. The goggles display live swim metrics directly in the swimmer’s field of view and can show pace, distance and GPS information during open-water swimming. To help triathletes get the most from their training, Rayofi includes an additional charging cable and a free swimming headset with every Holoswim 3 PRO.

Solving the strength training problem

The second challenge came from triathlon training itself.

Strength training is widely recognised as an important part of triathlon performance. It can help athletes improve power, maintain muscle balance and reduce the risk of injury. The challenge is consistency.

Between swimming, cycling, running, work commitments and frequent travel, many triathletes struggle to fit regular gym sessions into their schedules.

Traditional gym equipment is large, heavy and tied to a specific location. For athletes with busy schedules, maintaining consistent strength training can be difficult. To solve this problem, Rayofi developed the GoTone Portable Gym Machine.

The GoTone provides up to 30kg of electronically controlled resistance in a device weighing less than one kilogram. It allows athletes to perform strength training almost anywhere: at home, while travelling, in a hotel room, on a boat or outdoors.

Unlike traditional resistance bands, the GoTone uses a motor-controlled resistance system capable of both concentric and eccentric resistance training. Recent updates also introduced advanced Smart Modes, including Speed Mode, Progressive Resistance Mode and Eccentric Overload Mode.

These modes allow athletes to tailor resistance throughout the movement and perform training methods that are normally only available on much larger and more expensive equipment.

The goal is simple: provide serious strength training without requiring access to a gym.

Unlike traditional resistance bands, the GoTone uses a motor-controlled resistance system capable of both concentric and eccentric resistance training. Recent updates also introduced advanced Smart Modes, including Speed Mode, Progressive Resistance Mode, and Eccentric Overload Mode.

The goal is simple: provide serious strength training without requiring access to a gym.

Built by an athlete, for athletes

Rayofi’s philosophy is straightforward.

The company develops products that solve real training problems faced by endurance athletes.

Whether it is listening to music while swimming, receiving live coaching feedback in the water, viewing live swim data through smart swimming goggles or fitting a strength workout into a busy schedule, every Rayofi product starts with a practical challenge and is developed from an athlete’s perspective.

Find out more by visiting: rayofi.com/pages/swim-with-music