Applied Sports Science newsletter – October 31, 2018

Applied Sports Science news articles, blog posts and research papers for October 31, 2018

 

From invisible to indispensable: The story of Warren Foegele

theScore, John Matisz from

… Word spread within the scouting community: The 1996-born center with a commitment to the University of New Hampshire might be worth the traffic-ridden drive to Aurora, Ontario. A mid-January story on TSN, penned by the incomparable Bob McKenzie, stoked the fire at both the OHL and NHL levels.

“Some teams were skeptical about Warren because he was playing prep school hockey,” Top Shelf Sports Management’s Joe Resnick, who would later become Foegele’s agent, said recently. “The question was whether he could take that offensive dominance and translate it to the next level.”

Manning added: “At first, it was one or two NHL teams. Then it would turn into seven or eight. Then you’d have 16. Then we’d host our annual tournament and all 30 teams are in the building.”

 

‘Maniac’ Darius Leonard Has Gone from Clemson Castoff to Rookie NFL Sensation

Bleacher Report, Mike Tanier from

Darius Leonard always has a chip on his shoulder. But he never holds a grudge.

That’s a narrow path to walk. It’s an attitude that has worked for Leonard throughout his college career and sudden NFL rise.

It’s also a useful mindset when, say, a reporter from an outlet that ranked him as one of the worst picks in April’s draft calls for an interview just days after he wins NFL Defensive Rookie of the Month honors.

Leonard didn’t happen to see that not-so-complimentary bit of Bleacher Report post-draft analysis, did he?

“I have a picture of it on my phone,” Leonard said in a recent interview. “I look at it almost every week.”

 

Choosing high school over U.S. academy ball, three boys soccer stars are making their mark

Baltimore Sun, Glenn Graham from

… It was high school soccer at its best and senior Chase Webert, a star defender for the Dons, was happy to be a part of it.

[Chase] Webert and fellow standouts Richie Nichols of McDonogh and Alex Krause of River Hill each opted to suit up for his respective high school team this fall instead of continuing to play club ball for the U.S. Soccer Development Academy.

A special night like the one Webert had Thursday is one of the reasons all three are happy they decided to go the high school route.

“It was the biggest, most anticipated game since I’ve been at Loyola and the amount of people and atmosphere — like the first night game at Loyola — that was pretty awesome,” said Webert, who played for the Dons as a freshman before moving on to academy ball the past two years. “All your friends are there, your family and everybody in the community — it’s just really great to see how happy they all were after the game. It makes you want to play for more than the team. It’s about the community, and to win obviously was big.”

 

How does Athletic Bilbao’s academy manage to produce 85% of their team?

The Guardian, Alex Clapham from

The sleepy town of Lezama sits 10km outside of Bilbao and is home to just 2,400 people, but it also accommodates one of the most unusual football clubs in the world: Athletic Bilbao. Just 14 years after being founded, Athletic were accused of fielding ineligible foreign players in the 1911 Copa del Rey, so decided they would only ever pick players who were born in the Basque Country or “formed locally”. More than a century later, that policy remains in place and they are still one of three clubs who have never been relegated from the top tier of Spanish football, alongside Barcelona and Real Madrid.

The club’s reliance on local talent starts at their training ground in Lezama, which was opened in 1971 and now hosts the first team, the women’s teams and their various academy sides. There are eight pitches, a gymnasium, a press room and medical room in Lezama, but it is the iconic arch – which was relocated here from the old San Mamés stadium – that gives the place the feeling of a great institution.

“This football club becomes part of our identity from the second we’re born,” says Jon Solaun, who played for the club and now coaches their Under-16 team. “Any boy born within a 60km radius of here is showered with Athletic balloons and gifts; maternity wards are plastered in red and white. I was born in Bilbao and to put on this tracksuit and represent this club is everything to me. I know the boys feel the same pride. We all feel like a piece of history here as a family.

 

Medical Staff Integral to U.S. Women’s National Team Success

Team USA, Dan Scifo from

The athletic training staff of the U.S. Women’s National Team does everything it can to make sure players have everything they need to stay healthy and at the top of their game.

That includes being proactive and focusing on identifying dysfunctional movements that may predispose elite athletes to future injury.

Sheri Walters, who has worked with the U.S. Women’s National Team program as an athletic trainer and physical therapist since 2016, explained that it’s part of a long-term process to help players reach their maximum potential through training, strength and conditioning, and more.

“We started doing quite a bit of testing, and we did it even before the Olympics,” Walters said. “We look at posture and movement patterns that can contribute to overuse injuries, or acute injuries like hamstring and groin strains, high-ankle sprains and knee injuries.

“When we’re doing testing, we’re looking for mobility and stability issues specific to hockey. We would put them on a corrective exercise program to give them more available range of motion, not only for injury prevention, but to create the stability they need to take a massive slap shot.”

 

An inside look at how the Red Sox made a championship team

The Boston Globe, Alex Speier from

… Even before the start of spring training, new manager Alex Cora started forging bonds with and among the players, as when he traveled to different parts of the country to meet with them either individually or in small groups. In January, Cora met with David Price, Chris Sale, Sandy Leon, and Jackie Bradley Jr. for lunch in Fort Myers, Fla., a get-together that made an immediate impression.

From that point forward, Price observed, he felt with Cora “a very unique relationship. We’re always in contact, even when we’re away from the field.”

The sense of camaraderie built throughout the spring, particularly over concern for closer Craig Kimbrel’s infant daughter, Lydia, who required a heart procedure. When Kimbrel left the team in February, Cora and other members of the Red Sox remained in regular contact with him.

 

Mounting EPEDs Epidermal Paper Based Electronics on skin

YouTube, FlexiLab Purdue from

This video shows the transferring process of an EPED onto skin using a water-soluble tape.

 

Medication you can wear

EMPA from

For the «Self Care Materials» project, fibers are produced from biodegradable polymers using various processes. «The targeted use of the fiber determines which manufacturing process is best,» explains Empa researcher and project coordinator René Rossi. Delicate, light membranes with a large surface are formed during so-called electrospinning. If robust fibers are required, e.g. for protective clothing, it is better to draw the melted ingredients. In the end, all processes produce novel fibers, the nano-architecture of which is made up of several layers and components. «The properties of these new materials are currently being investigated with test substances,» says Rossi. In the finished product, for example, antibiotics or painkillers are to be integrated into the fibers.

 

The Future Is Knocking: Novel Sensors Could Enable Smarter Textiles

Lower Extremity Review Magazine from

A next-generation smart textile has been developed by a team of University of Delaware (UD) engineers using light, flexible, breathable carbon nanotube composite coatings on a range of natural and synthetic fibers, such as Kevlar, wool, nylon, Spandex, and polyester. Fabric coated with this sensing technology could be used in future smart garments where the sensors are stitched into clothing or slipped into the soles of shoes for detecting human motion. One potential application of the sensor-coated fabric is to measure forces on an individual’s foot while walking. This data could help clinicians assess imbalances after injury or help to prevent injury in athletes.

 

The Case for Studying the Human Dataome

Nautilus, Caleb Scharf from

You’ve heard the argument before: Genes are the permanent aristocracy of evolution, looking after themselves as fleshy hosts come and go. That’s the thesis of a book that, last year, was christened the most influential science book of all time: Richard Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene.

But we humans actually generate far more actionable information than is encoded in all of our combined genetic material, and we carry much of it into the future. The data outside of our biological selves—call it the dataome—could actually represent the grander scaffolding for complex life. The dataome may provide a universally recognizable signature of the slippery characteristic we call intelligence, and it might even teach us a thing or two about ourselves.

It is also something that has a considerable energetic burden. That burden challenges us to ask if we are manufacturing and protecting our dataome for our benefit alone, or, like the selfish gene, because the data makes us do this because that’s what ensures its propagation into the future.

 

NBA Schedule Alert! Games your team will lose in 2018-19

ESPN NBA, Baxter Holmes from

… Fatigue swings outcomes. Bettors know it. Players know it. Oddsmakers who set opening betting lines know it — and, since the early aughts, acknowledge that they’ve factored it into those betting lines to keep keen-eyed gamblers from taking them to the cleaners. Then, in recent months, two landmark events unfolded. First, a Supreme Court ruling allowed states to legalize sports gambling. Second, the NBA became the first major U.S. sports league to partner with a U.S. sportsbook, MGM Resorts.

That means we can finally discuss — yell from the rafters, even — the gambling tool that is Schedule Alert.

 

NHL won’t change restrictions on goalie pads

ESPN NHL, Emily Kaplan from

Despite a growing chorus of goaltenders who are displeased with the NHL’s new restrictions on goalie pads, the league has no plans to make a change.

“Some of the concerns we’re hearing now, they may grow in number, because you may hear somebody else do it, so you do it, too,” deputy commissioner Bill Daly told ESPN. “But I don’t think they’ll ever reach the point where we’d ever consider making changes.”

Daly added: “I like not to overreact to things. I don’t think that some of the concerns we’re hearing about currently are really reflective of a large majority of goaltenders.”

In hopes to “eliminate equipment advantages” and increase scoring, the NHL and NHLPA agreed upon new mandates for goaltender’s chest protectors this season. The new, more form-fitting silhouette features shoulder pads that were reduced by about an inch. In layman’s terms, they look less boxy.

 

Worried you’ve missed out on a ‘hot streak’ in life? It may be just around the corner

TODAY, A. Pawlowski from

When you’re striving to make your mark on the world, but it feels like slow going, take heart: Chances are good your time will come.

The vast majority of people will experience a “hot streak” during their lives — described as “an intriguing period of outstanding performance” with “bursts” of excellence coming one right after another — a recent study published in Nature found.

Haven’t had yours yet? It’s OK: The timing can be unpredictable.

The hot streak strikes randomly, meaning it could happen in early, mid- or late career, not just when a person is 30 to 40 years old, as conventional wisdom often suggests, said Dashun Wang, the study co-author and an associate professor of management and organizations at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.

 

This is the optimum way to compile a multiple-choice test, according to psychology research

The British Psychological Society, Research Digest, Bradley Busch from

Let’s start with a quick multiple-choice test about multiple-choice tests: when designing them, should you a) avoid using complex questions, b) have lots of potential answers for each question, c) all of the above or d) none of the above? The correct answer is (a), though as we’ll see, this was not a very well-crafted multiple-choice question.

The issue of how best to design multiple-choice questions is important since they have been popular in both education and business settings for many years now. This is due to them being quick to administer and easy to mark and grade. Furthermore, many students often report preferring them over other test formats.

As well as being a useful assessment tool, if they are well-designed they can also aid learning. This is because of the Testing Effect – the way that retrieving knowledge helps consolidate it in memory.

 

Dos and Don’ts for Athlete Wellness Questionnaires

SimpliFaster Blog, Cody Roberts from

… In the pyramid of monitoring strategies, a subjective questionnaire at any level truly is your entry point into athlete monitoring. It provides incredibly valuable data that can empower all parties involved and help efficiency and effectiveness all the way from training microcycles to mesocycles.

I’m not going to dive deeper into why you should monitor and the benefits, but I am going to expand on some simple strategic approaches to successfully implement a questionnaire in your training environment. It’s a process I’ve struggled with, reflected upon, and found success with that I want to share.

 

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