Applied Sports Science newsletter – July 16, 2016

… while Trout hasn’t necessarily improved, he also hasn’t gotten any worse. The adjustments he’s made have been for the purpose of not declining. Over the years, there have been a few adjustments. This year, Trout has folded in another. Actually, he’s folded in another two.

Firstly, Trout is more aggressive going after the first pitch. Not dramatically so, but observably so.

… When I went undrafted out of Duke in 2010, I became a basketball nomad. From Tobacco Road to southern China to New York City — with plenty of stops in between — I packed that duffle bag, hit the road and tried out for anybody willing to give me a look.

I love the game and my passion took me to interesting locations, but at that time it didn’t feel like much of an adventure. In my mind, I was an unemployed college graduate looking for work in one of the most cutthroat job markets out there.

At times, it was hard not to internalize the critics — including my own friends — when they questioned my journey.

In March, Sarah Brown gave birth to a daughter, Abigail.

And on Thursday night, under rainy skies and before a packed crowd at Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon, Brown found herself at the starting line of the women’s 1500-meters at the U.S. Olympic Team Trials, just four months after being in the delivery room.

While there are many mothers who are competing in track and field and in other Olympic sports, Brown would be the first to admit she was cutting it close in the race from delivery date to trying to make an Olympic team.

… But behind Tim Duncan’s staid, middle of the road public persona lies a hidden deviancy: his shooting arc.

Using location data tracked by the NBA’s SportVU camera system, we can analyze player shooting mechanics in exhaustive detail. For more background, see my introductory post on this topic from last year, as well as some more recent research on free throw shooting.

At the bottom of that recent post is a sortable table in which I have compiled free throw shot arc metrics for 304 NBA players. If you sort that table by launch angle, you’ll see that Tim Duncan has the lowest launch angle out of those 304 players. Duncan’s median release angle for free throws is just 45.2 degrees (Mike Conley has the highest release angle at 57.2 degrees).

Interview with Nick Levett, Talent Identification Manager at The Football Association.

Listen to a discussion on defining talent identification, unconscious bias, the importance of psychosocial traits, club recruitment of children and examples of talent development success.

Do people moderate their views when presented with overwhelming evidence to the contrary? Not necessarily, writes Matthew Syed.

We like to think that we apportion our beliefs to the evidence. After all, isn’t this the hallmark of rationality? When information comes along which reveals we should change our minds, we do.

Or do we?

BACKGROUND:

To examine the relationship between repeated sprint ability (RSA, 6 x 40 m (20 m + 20 m) with 20-s recovery) and neuromuscular and aerobic fitness variables in male collegiate soccer players.
METHODS:

Twenty-six players (age 22.5 ± 3.6 yr) were tested on separate days for countermovement jump (CMJ), squat jump (SJ), and standing long jump (LJ), and for maximal oxygen consumption ( O2max), velocity at onset of blood lactate accumulation (vOBLA), maximal aerobic speed (v O2max), and peak blood lactate concentration (peak [La]). They were also tested for best and mean times on a repeated shuttle sprint ability test.
RESULTS:

RSA best time (r = -0.73 and r = -0.54) and RSA mean sprint time (r = – 0.69 and r = -0.62) were significantly (p < 0.01) correlated with LJ and CMJ, respectively. Significant correlations (p < 0.05) were also found between RSA mean sprint time and sprint decrement with vOBLA (r = -0.44) and peak [La] (r = 0.47), respectively.
CONCLUSION:

This study showed that RSA performance had a large to very large association with the individual level of jump performance and to a smaller extent to aerobic fitness variables in male collegiate soccer players. Given this finding, lower limbs’ explosive-strength performance should be regarded as a relevant factor for male soccer.

We’re smack in the middle of a very busy sports summer, with –amongst others– the European Championships Football and Athletics, the Olympic Games and the Tour de France. From Monday the 11th until Thursday the 14th of July, over 200 scientist and students from the field of Sports Engineering come together in Delft from over the whole world for the 11th conference of the International Sports Engineering Association (ISEA).

Our purpose was to examine changes in single-leg landing biomechanics and movement control following alterations in mechanical task demands via external load and landing height. We examined lower-extremity kinematic, kinetic, and electromyographic (EMG) adjustments, as well as changes in movement control from neuromechanical synergies using separate principal component analyses (PCA). Nineteen healthy volunteers (15M, 4F, age: 24.3 ± 4.9 y, mass: 78.5 ± 14.7 kg, height: 1.73 ± 0.08 m) were analyzed among 9 single-leg drop landing trials in each of 6 experimental conditions (3 load and 2 landing height) computed as percentages of subject bodyweight (BW, BW + 12.5%, BW + 25%) and height (H12.5% & H25%). Condition order was counterbalanced, including: 1.) BW·H12.5, 2.) BW + 12.5·H12.5, 3.) BW + 25·H12.5, 4.) BW·H25, 5.) BW + 12.5·H25, 6.) BW + 25·H25. Lower-extremity sagittal joint angles and moments (hip, knee, & ankle), vertical ground reaction force (GRFz), and electrical muscle activity (gluteus maximus, biceps femoris, vastus medialis, medial gastrocnemius, & tibialis anterior muscles), were analyzed in each trial. Biomechanical adjustments and neuromechanical synergies were assessed using PCA. Subjects reduced effective landing height through segmental configuration adjustments at ground contact, extending at the hip and ankle joints with greater load and landing height (p ? 0.028 and p ? 0.013, respectively), while using greater medial gastrocnemius pre-activation with greater load (p ? 0.006). Dimension reduction was observed under greater mechanical task demands, compressing and restructuring synergies among patterns of muscle activation, applied loads, and segmental configurations. These results provide insight into movement control and potential injury mechanisms in landing activities.

… Runners waste so much time, energy and effort pursuing what they believe is the edge that will bring them success, while neglecting to carry out basic tasks properly. In the elite sporting world of today, you probably have to do both – get the basics right and do all the additional extras – to succeed. But be sure you are not obsessing too much on the latter, at the expense of the former. Make sure you bake a delicious, nutritious cake to a good recipe, before you think about the icing!

When Portugal and France take to the pitch in San Denis on Sunday night to compete to be crowned European champions, one question will hang over the Portuguese – just how fit is Cristiano Ronaldo?

“Modern fans still don’t have an appreciation for the amount of work that goes on behind the scenes to keep athletes’ bodies healthy and performing well,” Kitman Labs co-founder Stephen Smith told Newstalk.com.

… There’s a quiet predicament in the sports business, which is that the multi-decade-long gravy train of broadcasting dollars is going to come to an end. In his book, “Players: The Story of Sports, Money, and the Visionaries Who Fought to Make a Revolution,” Matthew Futterman describes it as a bubble, pointing to the significant subsidies that networks receive from cable companies, as well as the rising age of many fans (erectile dysfunction commercials during the World Series, anyone?), as signs that the old framework, designed for a half-a-trillion-dollar business long dominated by cartels, may be due for a new playbook. A skinnier one, likely with a lower price tag and diminished royalties.

So, as the industry heaves itself into an awkward embrace with VR startups, let us consider the ways in which this relationship might play out.

This notebook accompanies the Introduction to Deep Learning for Image Recognition workshop to explain the core concepts of deep learning with emphasis on classifying images as the application. Python data stack is used for the workshop.

Electromyography procedures, which record the electrical signals of muscles to diagnose neuromuscular disorders, usually require the insertion of a needle electrode into the muscle itself. Obviously, that isn’t exactly a pleasant experience, so a team at Tel Aviv University’s (TAU’s) Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology have developed a more comfortable and accessible alternative in the form of an electronic “tattoo” that unobtrusively monitors muscle activity, for a range of medical and commercial purposes.

Anyone who ever put on and forgot about a temporary tattoo as a kid will understand how unobtrusive the device is to wear, but this is a little more involved than the Road Runner rub-on that came with your cereal.

“Our ‘electric tattoo’ consists of three parts,” explains Yael Hanein, the TAU professor who led the study. “A carbon electrode, an adhesive surface that sticks temporary tattoos to the skin and a nanotechnology-based conductive polymer coating, with special nano-topography, that enhances the electrode’s performance.”

How would you feel if you got a message, addressing you by name, from a stranger who’d glimpsed you in a pub last night? Most people would find this creepy. But such a scenario is now a reality in Russia, thanks to FindFace, a smartphone app launched in February. It is, in effect, a real-world search engine for people: take a photo of someone with your phone, and the app can tell you who it is, with remarkable accuracy, by comparing the photo with profile pictures on VKontakte, a Russian social-networking site with about 200m users. In one test, FindFace correctly identified 70% of people on the St Petersburg metro. In another, carried out by Kapersky Labs, a cyber-security firm, it identified nine out of ten people in the firm’s Moscow office.

FindFace considers itself to be a high-tech dating app or, as such products invariably plead, “an innovative platform to find new friends”. If someone catches your eye, all you have to do is snap them to find out who they are. The app is powered by face-recognition software from NTechLab, another Russian startup, whose founders, Artem Kukharenko and Alexander Kabakov, suggest it is more versatile than other dating apps. You could, they suggest, feed the app an image of your favourite film star or an ex-partner, and it will give you a list of people who look similar. The app has already been downloaded nearly 650,000 times and has been used to perform more than 3m searches. NTechLab’s website says it is “focused on building software that makes the world a safer and more comfortable place”.

But FindFace is making many people feel just the opposite.

… Many individuals and organizations from the athletic community have already stepped up to take action on climate, and athletes are increasingly speaking out to raise awareness of the impacts of climate change on their sports and on society.

We want to hear about work that you or your organization are doing to address the impacts of climate change on athletics and to help athletes and teams serve as leaders on climate. What new, measurable steps are you taking to act on climate? Tell us what you are doing to respond to this call to action via this web form by September 2, 2016.

As the BJSM blog “Team doctors have the authority over managers to make medical decisions #PlayerSafety1st” pointed out, the Mourinho/Carneiro case has highlighted two critical issues: 1) gender discrimination in sport, and 2) a team doctor’s authority to make medical decisions, not the manager.

The second issue has rightly seen widespread outcry from the SEM community, and opened up much-needed conversation around scope of practice, and player safety. This included Lisa O’Neil’s excellent editorial “No way Jose! Clinicians have authority over patient care: The manager’s scope of practice does not cover medical decisions”.

Yet discrimination – specifically gender discrimination – the deeper underlying issue, has seen little to no commentary from within the SEM community. Whilst – as the recent BJSM blog post stated – “we applaud and celebrate all SEM practitioners who have a commitment to player welfare” – there has been limited outcry over the sexist treatment to which Dr Carneiro has been subjected, both in this case, and in the larger pattern of insidious and benevolent sexism which she has endured over her career.

… The question, discussed in serious tones on sidelines and debated in dressing rooms after matches, is are ACL injuries becoming more common? There is no definitive answer, says Moran, because there is no concrete data from yesteryear from which we can use to draw a comparison.

“If you go back 20 or 30 years you have a situation where the MRI scan was only coming into its own. If you go back about 40 years and you got a rotational injury to a knee and players had any sense of giving, it was assumed to be cartilage. I still see patients today in their 50s and 60s who have ruptured their ACL and don’t know it.”

Enda King, a physiotherapist and head of performance rehabilitation at the Sports Surgery Clinic, says ACL injuries are more common among those who play field sports, because the movements required are riskier to the knee.

Watching Cristiano Ronaldo go down early in the UEFA tourney was a shock to many. He tried many times to return, but was eventually taken off on a stretcher. Judging by the nature of the injury he likely suffered a medial collateral ligament tear. He deserves an enormous amount of credit for trying to continue playing because this is a very painful injury.

Force Therapeutics, a remote patient monitoring business providing physical therapy for people recovering from orthopedic procedures, has closed a $2.5 million financing round, according to a Form D filing on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s website.

In response to emailed questions, Mark Lieberman, the president of Force Therapeutics, said in an email that the company would use the new funding “to expand its product development capabilities, fund expansion and grow its national footprint.”

Nobel Prize winner Rod MacKinnon found that pungent and spicy tastes can hinder neurological misfires that cause cramps

Background: Previous studies have shown that professional hockey players return to sport at a high rate after hip arthroscopy, although it is unknown how long players continue to compete at a professional level after surgery.

Purpose: To determine the prevalence of athletes who continued playing in the National Hockey League (NHL) for a minimum of 5 years after hip arthroscopy for treatment of symptomatic femoroacetabular impingement (FAI) and to determine predictors associated with length of career.

Study Design: Case series; Level of evidence, 4.

Methods: A total of 60 professional hockey players (69 hips) underwent hip arthroscopy for FAI by a single surgeon between 2005 and 2010. Data were retrieved from NHL.com and Hockey-reference.com regarding information on each player’s professional career. Position played, age, surgical procedure, and intraoperative findings were also used in data analysis.

Results: There were 12 centers, 15 defensemen, 16 goalies, and 17 wings studied. Of the 60 athletes, 40 (67%) continued to play professionally a minimum of 5 years after hip arthroscopy. As of the 2015 season, the mean length of a player’s NHL career was 13.7 years (range, 2-27 years), with an average of 5.9 years played after hip arthroscopy. There was no difference in length of career or years played when goalies were compared with other positions (P = .760). Length of career and years played after arthroscopy correlated with age at surgery (r = 0.799 and ?0.408, respectively). Players who played ?5 years after arthroscopy were significantly younger than those who did not (25 vs 30 years; P = .001). Athletes who played <5 years after arthroscopy had a longer average duration of symptoms before surgery when compared with those who played ?5 years (20.2 vs 9.3 months; P = .049). There were no differences in length of career or years played after arthroscopy based on type of labral treatment.

Conclusion: Professional NHL players who underwent hip arthroscopy for FAI were able to continue playing for an average of 5.9 years after surgery, with 67% playing a minimum of 5 years postoperatively. Younger age and shorter duration of symptoms at time of surgery correlated with greater length of career and years played after hip arthroscopy. Players who did not play a minimum of 5 years postoperatively had significantly longer duration of symptoms before surgery. The study data support early arthroscopic treatment of professional hockey players with symptomatic FAI.

The American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) is the world’s largest organization of sports medicine and exercise science professionals. Over 6,800 exercise scientists, sports dietitians, physicians, and health professionals gathered to share their research at this Sports Medicine’s annual meeting in Boston from May 31st to June 4th. What was the hot topic? Weight and Protein and how they impact performance.

Learning leaves its mark on the brain. The recently identified ‘learning protein’ Copine-6 plays a crucial role in this process. Scientists from the Biozentrum at the University of Basel have now discovered that this protein strengthens the connections between nerve cells, accelerating the flow of information and thereby forming the basis for learning and memory. The absence of this protein leads to learning deficits. The study has recently been published in Nature Communications.

… Every week another athlete is banned from competing in their sport after tested positive for prohibited substances. As an athlete, the responsibility lies with you to know whether a medication you’ve been taken for years, a new protein powder or any supplement is safe and suitable to eat. It doesn’t matter whether you compete as an elite or recreational athlete, you alone are ultimately responsible for ensuring that anything you consume is safe and not on the WADA prohibited substances list.

Clean sport is all about creating a culture where sport is fair and competitive so athletes can compete free from fear that competitors have wrongly enhanced their performance. There is no room for cheating, with calls now being made in some sports for lifetime bans in some circumstances.

An independent pharmaceutical company has entered into the study of the cannabis plant’s therapeutic value. Can it help NFL players?

In 1987, Plano became the first school to win back-to-back football titles in Class 5A. The Wildcats had a strong defense and crafty quarterback Steve Needham, but their offensive line was probably the biggest star.

“They should be playing professionally,” Roosevelt coach Willie Dearion said of Plano’s offensive line. “Very seldom do you find linemen with that size.”

Plano’s starting offensive linemen were described as “massive” and “immense” during that season. So how big were they?

They averaged 246 pounds.

Qualitative research investigating soccer practitioners’ perceptions can allow researchers to create practical research investigations. The extra-time period of soccer is understudied compared to other areas of soccer research. Using an open-ended online survey containing eleven main and nine sub questions, we gathered the perceptions of extra-time from 46 soccer practitioners, all working for different professional soccer clubs. Questions related to current practices, views on extra-time regulations, and ideas for future research. Using inductive content analysis, the following general dimensions were identified: ‘importance of extra-time’, ‘rule changes’, ‘efficacy of extra-time hydro-nutritional provision’, ‘nutritional timing’, ‘future research directions’, ‘preparatory modulations’ and ‘recovery’. The majority of practitioners (63%) either agreed or strongly agreed that extra-time is an important period for determining success in knockout football match-play. When asked if a fourth substitution should be permitted in extra-time, 67% agreed. The use of hydro-nutritional strategies prior to extra-time was predominately considered important or very important. However; only 41% of practitioners felt that it was the most important time point for the use of nutritional products. A similar number of practitioners account (50%) and do not (50%) account for the potential of extra-time when training and preparing players and 89% of practitioners stated that extra-time influences recovery practices following matches. In the five minute break prior to extra-time, the following practices (in order of priority) were advocated to players: hydration, energy provision, massage, and tactical preparations. Additionally, 87% of practitioners advocate a particular nutritional supplementation strategy prior to extra-time. In order of importance, practitioners see the following as future research areas: nutritional interventions, fatigue responses, acute injury risk, recovery modalities, training paradigms, injury epidemiology, and environmental considerations. This study presents novel insight into the practitioner perceptions of extra-time and provides information to readers about current applied practices and potential future research opportunities. [full text]

… I wrote about using a ‘back-of-the-envelope’ unit-weighted algorithm for scouting footballers a few years ago for theScore (an article that sadly lives on only via the Wayback Machine).

The difference this time around is I would like to finally implement one, test it, and compare it to subjective judgments from myself and others, whether from fans or media pundits.

… Racing sports are too simple to afford rules that are breakable. If the punishment for shoving the leading cyclist to the ground was a one-minute penalty added to the offender’s time, the sport would mutate into a frenzy of calculated shoving. Instead, the vast majority of penalties in road cycling are mostly weird, small fines that don’t really change the outcome of the event.

Professional football players are heftier now than they were decades ago, but a new study from researchers at Tufts University School of Medicine shows that even players for less-prominent college football programs are getting bigger. The Tufts researchers report that the average weight of offensive linemen in a Division III collegiate football conference has increased nearly 38 percent since 1956, while the average male’s weight increased only 12 percent during the same timeframe. These findings are published in the Journal of Athletic Training and highlight the need to modify athletes’ post-football lifestyles in order to prevent long-term health problems.

“Increases in weight and body mass index (BMI) are associated with cholesterol disorders, diabetes, hypertension and cardiovascular diseases. The results of our study emphasize the importance of helping these players to develop a healthy post-football lifestyle in order to reduce their risks of serious long-term health complications,” says senior author David J. Greenblatt, M.D., Louis Lasagna Professor in the Department of Integrative Physiology and Pathobiology at Tufts University School of Medicine and a member of the Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics graduate program faculty at the Sackler School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences at Tufts.

As the competition has progressed, we have been able to witness a number of tactical trends shared by many teams in the tournament. Whilst there hasn’t been a particular pattern in terms of formations like we saw with the back 3 in the 2014 World Cup, there have been clear trends in marking schemes, attacking strategies and other tactical features.

In this article I will be taking a look at the two most prevalent themes we have seen in this year’s international competition.