Applied Sports Science is a lot of things and I try to pay attention to all of them: athlete training, sports medicine, human performance psychology, nutrition, sensor data systems, sports analytics, coaching strategy/tactics, sports management, to name most. The real world things where sports science seem to make the greatest difference is a shorter list, […]
Read More →Archive for December, 2014
Last Week in Applied Sports Science, 12/14-12/20
I was lucky to study Computer Science in grad school at a time when digital collaboration had become something research paid attention to. Not that people went out of their way to make it interesting or exciting. They called it CSCW, computer-supported collaborative work. (Still call it that.) The field was young enough that most […]
Read More →Injuries are a big problem in the U.S. basketball talent development process
Eight of the first 11 players picked in 2014 NBA Draft have already experienced injuries, severe injuries in some cases. Something is broken in the process of developing elite basketball talent. If this was an bridge or a building, you would consider this level of mechanical breakdown to be a catastrophic failure. Teams, coaches and […]
Read More →Last Week in Applied Sports Science, 12/7-12/13
Whatever it is that separates mind from body, it is absolutely fascinating. I try to always keep in mind that athletic performance is the result of the human neuro-muscular system, and that the neuro and the muscular share a deep fundamental connection. Even as evidence comes in about the connection the getting the full story still seems […]
Read More →What does a “Coaching Research Laboratory” look like?
The U.S. culture around innovation and technology is infiltrating sports, something that impacts the practice of sports science everywhere. One big factor in the trend is the research excellence that American universities have long made a priority. More college sport teams have become living laboratories within their schools, a sensible progression that has seen science, […]
Read More →Last Week in Applied Sports Science, 11/30-12/6
USA Women’s Volleyball is getting attention, deservedly. As a team and an organization it ranks among the most innovative in the U.S. A US Olympic Committee TeamUSA.org article takes a close look at how the team first gained team chemistry and then kept working on it as the team won the 2014 FIVB World Championship. The Portland Tribune […]
Read More →The emerging Applied Sports Science stack
Lock-in used to be a big thing in software business models. Before lean startups and minimum viable products, before technologists were aware of people’s habits, before Javascript became a full-fledged programming language, before the web browser become an all-purpose interface for computer interaction and software became services, customers looking for vendors to solve a problem […]
Read More →Sports science can improve lots of things but a bad coach might not be one of them
Stan Van Gundy, coach of the NBA Detroit Pistons, is clueless about his own team. The damning assessment is the only logical conclusion based how he’s described his team as it loses game after game (currently 9 in a row). Last week he said the big problem was “energy” and then just yesterday after losing […]
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