Applied Sports Science newsletter – June 22, 2020

Applied Sports Science news articles, blog posts and research papers for June 22, 2020

 

Olympic Athletes Address Climate Change While Quarantined At Home

YouTube, NBC News from

NBC News’ Leigh Ann Caldwell speaks to a group of Olympic athletes who are addressing climate change while quarantined at home. [video, 4:11]


John Kessel on life after USA Volleyball: Hail does not make rainbows

Volleyball magazine, John Kessel from

John Kessel has been a fixture at USA Volleyball since 1985. He chose not to go into college coaching, but to coach coaches. In 1995, Volleyball magazine’s special Centennial issue named him one of the 50 most important people in the sport in the past 100 years. In 2019 he received the organization’s highest honor, the Frier Award. His USAV tenure ended this past week and now he plans to devote all his time to Bison Peak Lodge in the Colorado Mountains west of Colorado Springs. We asked him to give his thoughts as he retires as USA Volleyball’s director of sport development and starts a new chapter of his life:


South Carolina women’s basketball: Pandemic workouts

The State newspaper (Columbia, SC), Greg Hadley from

No, Molly Binetti says, you won’t see any social media posts of South Carolina women’s basketball players pushing cars and trucks for a workout like some other athletes.

But in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the Gamecocks’ strength and conditioning coach said she’s still had to get creative in helping players stay in shape.


NFLPA advises players to avoid group workouts

FootballScoop, Doug Samuels from

NFLPA Medical Director Dr. Thom Mayer released a statement to all players today that reads asking them to avoid group workouts. NFL teams were able to open their facility doors to business personnel back in mid-May (provided state and local governments okay it) back.


Decide Now or Wait for Something Better?

University of Zurich (Switzerland), News from

When we make decisions, we don’t always have all options available to choose from at the same time. Instead they often come one after another, as for example when we search for an apartment or a flight ticket. So we have to decide on something without knowing if a better option might have come along later. A study at the University of Zurich has shown that our standards drop more and more in the course of decision-making.


UC Berkeley center pioneers the science of well-being

San Jose Mercury News, Bay Area News Group, Martha Ross from

The Greater Good Science Center has spent the past two decades sharing the growing body of research that shows what really makes people happy and resilient.


Impact of Potential Physiological Changes due to COVID-19 Home Confinement on Athlete Health Protection in Elite Sports: a Call for Awareness in Sports Programming

Sports Medicine journal from

A global emergency characterized by a respiratory illness called COVID-19 (coronavirus disease) has spread worldwide in early 2020. Preventive measures to reduce the risk of infection include social distancing and the closing of commercial activities to avoid social gatherings. Elite sport is also tremendously affected: ongoing championships have been suspended and the major international events have been postponed (e.g. Summer Olympics, UEFA European Football Championship). This is the first time since the Second World War that all elite athletes are forced to interrupt competitions. Further, most elite athletes are forced to train at home, on their own and mostly unsupervised. Some elite sports clubs have provided players with home-based training programs and/or organized video conferences for online training sessions lead by their fitness trainers. However, logistical constraints and the difficulty to implement sport-specific exercise strategies in the absence of official sports facilities/playgrounds, make it difficult to provide training solutions comparable to those adopted under normal circumstances. During COVID-19 home confinement, athletes are likely exposed to some level of detraining (i.e. the partial or complete loss of training-induced morphological and physiological adaptations), as a consequence of insufficient and/or inappropriate training stimuli [1]. Such changes may result in impaired performance and increased injury risk (e.g. ligament rupture and muscle injuries) if, upon restart, an appropriate sport-specific reconditioning cannot be granted. Moreover, athletes on their return to sports journey may suffer from inappropriate rehabilitation/reconditioning and, therefore, a higher risk of re-injury, when championships would suddenly continue. Cardiorespiratory and neuromuscular adaptations are fundamental in different sports and substantial declines (e.g. 4–14% in maximal oxygen uptake) are known to occur after short-term (< 4 weeks) training cessation [1]. Further, injury occurrence seems to be regulated by a complex mechanical interplay between tissue stress, strain and loading [2]. Therefore, alterations in mechanical structures, such as muscles and tendons, are likely involved in the injury process. [full text]


Man & machine: Adaptive tools for the contemporary performance analyst

Journal of Sports Sciences from

Sport, like many industries, is experiencing growth in resources, professionalism and data generation. An understanding of how humans can effectively and efficiently interact with technology, computers and other machines to improve sports performance is still being developed. As a consequence, the landscape in which the performance analyst now finds themselves has fundamentally changed. New, improved and different skill sets are now required in order to be impactful and experience sustained success. However, this growth also presents new opportunities to address difficult problems, including many that were previously considered intractable. This article lists ten essential adaptive tools for the contemporary performance analyst, many of which are useful in both research and applied sporting environments. A rationale for each is proposed, with an emphasis on ensuring that the performance analyst will be equipped to thrive in both current and future sport environments [full text]


How to have a healthy relationship with your fitness tracker

Well+Good, Rachel Lapidos from

… This is a relatively modern way of living—though I (and you) have lived for decades without knowing what our heart rate variability is at any given moment or how many cycles of REM sleep that we clocked the night before, it’s interesting to be bombarded with detailed insights at a flick of the wrist. These days, trackers are telling us things like whether we should train hard or recover, go to bed earlier, or skip that early morning workout in order to sleep instead.

With the growing amount of advice coming out of these trackers, it can start to feel like your wearable holds more weight in your workout or recovery decisions than your own common sense (and how you feel). Just how can you keep a balanced relationship with your wearable? We asked experts for some insight.


NBA players can wear smart rings to detect COVID-19 symptoms when season returns

CBS News, Christopher Brito from

NBA players will have the option of wearing a smart-tech ring that could provide early detection of COVID-19 symptoms when the season resumes in late July. The rings, made by Oura Health, were the focus of a study that found they could help track coronavirus symptoms up to three days before they show up.

The National Basketball Players Association sent out a memo earlier to its players this week laying out several safety measures that will be implemented when the season restarts at the Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando. Among them, the option of wearing Oura rings, The Athletic first reported.

Initially marketed as a sleep tracking device, the Oura Ring monitors physiological data such as temperature, breathing and heart patterns. The West Virginia University Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute (RNI) and WVU Medicine partnered with Oura to develop a digital platform designed to find COVID-19 symptoms in advance.


Validity of Wrist-Worn photoplethysmography devices to measure heart rate: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Journal of Sports Sciences from

Heart rate (HR), when combined with accelerometry, can dramatically improve estimates of energy expenditure and sleep. Advancements in technology, via the development and introduction of small, low-cost photoplethysmography devices embedded within wrist-worn consumer wearables, have made the collection of heart rate (HR) under free-living conditions more feasible. This systematic review and meta-analysis compared the validity of wrist-worn HR estimates to a criterion measure of HR (electrocardiography ECG or chest strap). Searches of PubMed/Medline, Web of Science, EBSCOhost, PsycINFO, and EMBASE resulted in a total of 44 articles representing 738 effect sizes across 15 different brands. Multi-level random effects meta-analyses resulted in a small mean difference (beats per min, bpm) of −0.40 bpm (95 confidence interval (CI) −1.64 to 0.83) during sleep, −0.01 bpm (−0.02 to 0.00) during rest, −0.51 bpm (−1.60 to 0.58) during treadmill activities (walking to running), while the mean difference was larger during resistance training (−7.26 bpm, −10.46 to −4.07) and cycling (−4.55 bpm, −7.24 to −1.87). Mean difference increased by 3 bpm (2.5 to 3.5) per 10 bpm increase of HR for resistance training. Wrist-worn devices that measure HR demonstrate acceptable validity compared to a criterion measure of HR for most common activities.


Colleges aim to restart sports. What’s that going to look like around here?

Philadelphia Inquirer, Mike Jensen from

… “Somebody said to me, we’re building the plane while we’re flying the plane,” said Jessica Reo, Temple’s senior associate athletic director, who chairs the school’s Temple Athletics’ Return to Participation committee. “We do believe there are going to be adjustments.”

“At this time of year, you usually have your plans already made,” said Delaware Valley athletic director Dave Duda. “Right now, we’re constantly preparing scenarios. Here’s Scenario 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 — they keep going. What keeps me up at night – is Plan 1 thorough enough? Plan 2? Is Plan 3 workable?”


Coronavirus and college sports: Schools’ positive tests among athletes

USA Today Sports from

The coronavirus has drastically affected the sports world, leading to cancellations and postponements from major pro leagues and NCAA events as the world attempts to slow the spread of COVID-19. But as college football players and other athletes across the country have started returning to campus for workouts, many are testing positive for the virus.

Here’s a look at several schools who have reported positive COVID-19 tests among their student-athletes. Several schools have decided not to publicly release test results.


College football isn’t just battling COVID-19, but trust, discipline, protection issues as well

Deseret News, Dick Harmon from

BYU, Utah, Utah State, Weber State, Southern Utah and Dixie State might be welcoming back athletes, but the biggest challenge is yet to come when camps are filled, drills held and classrooms fill. This is tough


Climate change: Sport heading for a fall as temperatures rise

BBC News, Science & Environment, Matt McGrath from

Global sport faces major disruption from climate change in coming decades, according to a new analysis.

By 2050, it’s estimated that almost one in four English football league grounds can expect flooding every year.

But tennis, rugby, athletics and winter sports will also face serious challenges from the impacts of rising temperatures, the author says.

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