Of the four judges who were scoring the boxing match between Oleksandr Usyk and Tyson Fury last December, one was missing a key characteristic that the other three shared in the flesh.
In what was believed to be the first, AI technology was used unofficially to monitor fights and score matches.
The AI judge agreed with his three human counterparts who gave the match to USYK, but felt he took more rounds and won by a wider margin.
Although the AI scorecard was not part of the official results, its use in competitions demonstrates how technology is incorporated into sports such as figure skating and diving, where judge subjectivity plays a major role. This was the latest example.
Experts say AI has the potential to improve certain problems that can hinder human review, but they suggest it can also present its own challenges.
AI might do a decent job of determining the difficulty of a performance, says Willem Standaert, an associate professor at Hec Liège in Belgium who researches sports digitization. “On the other hand, execution can be more difficult.”
This week, AI is being used to informally judge snowboarders competing in halfpipe events during the X Games at Buttermilk Mountain in Aspen, Colo.
A video camera captures each athlete’s movements, and artificial intelligence takes that information and provides a score for the routine, The New York Times reported.
X Games’ AI has no impact on official scoring, but is a gauge of what’s possible in the future
“Humans can get it wrong.”
“Part of sports being subjective, we see it all over the place, is that at the best of times, humans can get it wrong,” X Games CEO Jeremy Bloom told The Associated Press. Ta.
“It makes a lot of sense to sometimes get it wrong. What if we could give the judges superpowers and see things that the human eye couldn’t see? This technology could give them Can you help me let me know?”
Some sports fans may be accustomed to using AI as judges in sports where artistic merit has no bearing on the outcome of the competition.

For example, the U.S. Open tennis tournament has had no line judges since 2021. Last October, Wimbledon organizers announced that line judges at the oldest Grand Slam tennis tournament would be replaced with electronic line calls.
But now this technique is being considered in other sports where judging the difficulty and execution of an athlete’s routine is part of the competition.
Last year, International Skating Union (ISU) director Colin Smith said Bodie was considering using AI to judge technical elements of skating, The Scotsman reported.
Also, in the release of the International Olympic Committee’s AI Agenda last year, IOC President Thomas Bach said that AI would “help reduce human bias in judging and refereeing.”
On the other hand, it is already used in the artistic gymnastics of judges, but only in a supporting role. The technology, known as Judging Support System (JSS), was first used at the 2023 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships in Antwerp, Belgium, and will be used to judge all equipment including Vault, Uneven Bars, Beam and Floor. is.

Coaches can ask judges to use the AI system to review their performance if they disagree with the score.
According to the website of JSS manufacturer Fujitsu, the technology captures 3D data of an athlete’s performance.
Movements such as joint angles that are part of the judging scorecard are captured and analyzed as numerical data and displayed in the same way that judges need to see them.
Still, this technology has not yet been used as a replacement for judging in major competitions where subjectivity plays a role.
Standaert said AI could run into problems when it comes to determining the artistic merit of everyday life, or the artistic merit of its “talent.”
“For example, especially in gymnastics floor exercises, there’s music. How well do the gymnasts get along with the music that’s being played?
But AI does have an advantage over human judges, Standaert said, when it comes to certain potential biases that may be based on an athlete’s nationality.
He says it has advantages over the physical limitations of human judges – only poor eyesight, cognitive speed and fatigue after a long day of judging.
Olympic organizers have shared plans to use artificial intelligence to transform the sports environment. New technology has the potential to improve everything from screening to international scouting efforts.
Resolves some biases and introduces new ones
However, Standaert said research with gymnasts revealed biases within the AI, including a bias against greater gymnasts.
Another issue with AI is skin color, he said, with darker-skinned athletes and gymnasts seemingly unable to be captured on video, as well as lighter-skinned athletes.
“By addressing the bias, we introduce something new,” he said.
He also suggested that while judges might reward innovation in everyday athletes, AI might say, “Well, this isn’t in the rule book. I don’t know what to do.” . “
For now, Standaert believes AI will continue to play a collaborative role, and that for the artistic elements of these types of sports, “they definitely have to keep the humans.” I am.
Bloom, the CEO of X Games, says he doesn’t imagine a future without human judges.
“I don’t think this will replace the judges,” Bloom said, “but I think it will give them the power to ensure objectivity.”