SHANGHAI, April 5 (Xinhua) — Online exercise programs fueled by advanced technologies have been embraced in China as many ordinary citizens and sports enthusiasts have taken to at-home workouts amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Zhao Lina, goalkeeper of China's national women's football team, posted a video clip on social media showing her at-home workouts with the aid of artificial intelligence (AI) which soon went viral.

The video shows the Shanghai player completing a series of standard workouts including deep squat jacks and push-ups, and then advocating the adoption of at-home sports AI to people who are locked down amid a resurgence of COVID-19.

Sports AI, launched by AlibabaSports Group, is based on AI image recognition technology, allowing users to do countable and correctable workouts with only a cellphone and three to four square meters of space at home.

The technology, which detects body contours in real-time through cameras, tracks the key attachment points of the skeletal system to analyze the completion of movements to help achieve exercisers' desired fitness training results.

The smart fitness solution has trended in sports shopping festivals promoted through online campaigns, live streamings and offline training programs by many brands.

According to AlibabaSports, more than 750,000 users have already adopted at-home workouts via sports AI, with the top five workouts being deep squats, straight arm jacks, squat jacks, jumping rope and jumping jacks.

"At first, we regarded sports AI as a technology, and then a product, and now we believe that it is also a solution that can combine online and offline resources to hold sports events through digital methods," said Huang Chunxiang, vice president of AlibabaSports.

"Sports will eventually return to the real world, and sports AI undoubtedly inspires everyone to overcome the pandemic and get their lives back on track," he added.

(Source: Xinhua)