Applied Sports Science newsletter – December 14, 2016

… “For Kerber to win two majors, almost out of nowhere,” Gilbert continued, “I did not see that coming.”

Who did? Perhaps only Kerber herself and longtime coach Torben Beltz.

Her 2015 season was typical of the recent success that came with three consecutive year-end finishes in the top 10. The lefty won $1.9 million and four titles — in the relatively modest venues of Charleston, Stuttgart, Birmingham and Stanford — more than doubling her previous career victory total. Her match record was 53-22. A thoroughly professional effort, but her record in majors was only 6-4 and she failed to advance past the third round.

This caused Kerber to rethink her career.

The moment came on the first Friday on the last month of the year, on the courts of the Elite Squad Tennis Club in Overland Park, Ks., just outside of Kansas City. It happened at the end of a long week of two-a-days, hours into an already-grueling session, at what would be the toughest moment of his training week. Jack Sock had just finished more than a dozen sets of a court-coverage drill—as Sock hit balls to his coaches, Mike Wolf and Troy Hahn, on the opposite side the court, they quickly returned them to the other end, but just away from Sock, out of his reach, forcing him to constantly race back and forth. Completely gassed, Sock turned to his coaches.

“Let’s keep going,” he said.

With the same rules in place—hit the ball back in play on one bounce and sustain the intensity level—Sock resumed the drill.

Wesley Matthews told us so.

He promised he’d be a better player than he was before he ruptured his left Achilles tendon, an injury that has ruined many NBA careers. He didn’t care how much the odds were stacked against him or how many people doubted him, particularly after he had the worst shooting season of his career in his comeback year. Those struggles were magnified by the spotlight that came with signing a maximum contract with the Dallas Mavericks.

Matthews claims the ugly statistics, which continued in the first month of this season, never affected his confidence. He’ll tell you he knew what kind of player he could and would be.

It’s 1 AM ET and the Sacramento Kings have just landed in Washington D.C. Just hours prior, they’ve pulled off a blowout victory in Brooklyn. Between players, coaches, staff and media, two buses plus a truck carry the conglomerate and their belongings.

This is no small task. We’re talking well over 100 pieces of luggage and equipment that has to be unloaded in their D.C. hotel. Upon arrival, Kings staff help unpack the massive amount of baggage – organizing equipment and aiding hotel stewards assign player belongings to each appropriate room.

It’s a tedious and tiring process – especially taxing on the road as the team travels through different time zones, climates and venues. But it’s one that’s expedited due to the planning set in place months prior. Between Kings Director of Sports Medicine Pete Youngman, Head Equipment Manager Dwayne Wilson and Assistant Equipment Manager Miguel Lopez, preparation for this date alongside every other throughout the 2016-17 season began in mid-August.

Growing up, Travis Dorsch played football, basketball, baseball, and soccer. And he ran track. In college, he was an All-America kicker for Purdue’s football team, setting him up to play a few years in the NFL. In adulthood, he’s taken up competing in Ironman triathlons.

Today, Dorsch (HHS’03, MS HHS’07, PhD HHS’13) is an assistant professor at Utah State University and a new parent, the father of daughter Josephine and son Bridger. But he has always been an athlete. Because of it all, the words his PhD adviser at Purdue, Al Smith, told him years ago probably ring especially true. “We all study what we are,” Dorsch remembers Smith telling him.

In his new career, Dorsch studies everything he is and everything he’s been, leading research efforts to investigate the complicated intersection between youth sports and parental involvement. Specifically, he is seeking to shine a light on families’ investment, whether it be tangible or intangible, in their children’s participation in sports and the issues that arise — or might arise — from it, for better and worse.

In the previous post we discussed the importance of a ballplayer’s first year of strength-training, and how to go about making the most of that first year.

Today we will extend from that topic by discussing further the great window of adaptation that novice athletes possess, and why it is important to slow-cook their development, rather than attempt to move too quickly through the training process.

Three of the world’s top distance runners will skip major marathons this spring so they can focus instead on a Nike Inc. project to produce the world’s first sub-2 hour marathon, a high-stakes marketing ploy by the sneaker giant.

Breaking the 2-hour barrier is considered one of the last frontiers in the running world, and for years has been a consistent topic of debate within the sport. The current world record of 2:02:57 was set by Kenya’s Dennis Kimetto in 2014.

For Nike, a company rooted in running culture that sponsors and outfits most of the sport’s elite competitors, the initiative is a risky undertaking that comes as the company faces increasing pressure to prove it is a step ahead of competitors like Adidas AG and Under Armour Inc.

It takes years to master and countless hours of practice, but footwork can be the difference between “good” and “great” in the NBA. Giannis, DeMar, coaches, and trainers talk about the art and science of this fundamental basketball skill.

It remains to be determined whether running training influences the amplitude of lower limb muscle activations prior to and during the first half of stance, and whether such changes are associated with joint stiffness regulation and usage of stored energy from tendons. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate neuromuscular and movement adaptations before and during landing in response to running training across a range of speeds. Two groups of high mileage (HM; >45 km/wk, n=13) and low mileage (LM; <15 km/wk, n=13) runners ran at four speeds (2.5-5.5 m∙s-1) while lower limb mechanics and electromyography of the thigh muscles were collected. There were few differences in pre-landing activation levels, but HM runners displayed lower activations of the Rectus Femoris, Vastus Medialis and Semitendinosus muscles post-landing, and these differences increased with running speed. HM runners also demonstrated higher initial knee stiffness during the impact phase compared to LM runners which was associated with an earlier peak knee flexion velocity, and both were relatively unchanged by running speed. In contrast, LM runners had higher knee stiffness during the slightly later weight acceptance phase and the disparity was amplified with increases in speed. It was concluded that initial knee joint stiffness might predominantly be governed by tendon stiffness rather than muscular activations before landing. Estimated elastic work about the ankle was found to be higher in the HM runners which might play a role in reducing weight acceptance phase muscle activation levels and improve muscle activation efficiency with running training.

In this week’s edition of In the Gym at EFT, performance specialist Landon Cox demonstrates basketball explosive power development with Nojel Eastern of Evanston Township High School.

… NextVR’s remarkable work with the NFL and the NBA provides a virtual experience that is far more engaging and dramatic. The slick highlights packages they produce for the NFL are released after the games, but NextVR is uniquely equipped to do live VR video. The company uses the same crew, gear, and processes to broadcast one live NBA game each week. They use eight camera rigs, hop between camera angles, and include onscreen graphics and play-by-play announcers.

We aren’t talking 360 video, either. There’s no confusion about where to look, as NextVR’s rigs use a 180-degree field of view to record only the action in front of them. The hardware is more 3-D camera than VR camera, with processing tricks that add depth and boost the sense of realism. Each double-barrel RED rig captures 6K video for each eye. That’s tens of millions more pixels than any headset can display now, but NextVR wants to future-proof its content.

… Sportradar makes a further commitment to serve and empower young sports startups with the announcement of Acceleradar, “the Sports Industry’s First Free Data Plan”. Eligible participants will be given free access to Sportradar data for up to one year!

If the average is maintained it will be the highest-scoring season in 20-team Premier League history, but as usual there is far from a single, simple explanation

Simply put, Cognitive Biases are thinking errors. They are flaws in judgement that everyone is susceptible to. Marketers, salesmen, the media and politicians depend on our unawareness of these biases to sell their products, services and messages.

We are all guilty of expressing them and at times being blind to them. Basketball coaches are no different. Being aware of them can help coaches make clear decisions and recognize blind spots.