Dropped passes were an issue for Broncos wide receiver Jerry Jeudy during his rookie season and head coach Vic Fangio said last December that he feels Jeudy has the right make-up to improve on that front this year.
During a Tuesday press conference, Jeudy was asked about what he learned about the cause of his drops from watching tape of last season and where he’ll make changes as a result.
“Mostly concentration and focus on the ball,” Jeudy said. “I’d be so quick to catch and run, hurry up and make a play instead of catch first and then run. That’s mostly what it is, just trying to make a play too fast and not focused on the bigger picture.”
Henry Ruggs III has been going through an extensive training and diet program this offseason in preparation for his second season. The speedy receiver has been able to gain some serious muscle mass in the process, deciding to go back to where it all started and train in his hometown of Montgomery, Alabama, at MadHouse Training.
The game-changing effect of super spikes on track and field was again dramatically emphasised in Hengelo on Sunday as Sifan Hassan obliterated the women’s 10,000m record by more than 10 seconds.
On a day when Britain’s Dina Asher-Smith ran a meeting record of 10.92sec in the women’s 100m, it was the Dutchwoman who stole the show in front of her home fans. The 28-year-old Hassan, who appeared to be wearing the latest version of the Nike ZoomX Dragonfly spikes, which have been billed as the “fastest shoes ever”, ran 29:06.82 to destroy the previous best of 29:17:45 set by Almaz Ayana of Ethiopia at the 2016 Olympics.
Soccer players incur injuries that typically affect their performance. Injuries are caused by intrinsic and extrinsic factors that call for multifactorial preventive interventions. The study examines the impact of the FIFA 11+ warm up programme on the incidence and severity of injuries in second division soccer players in Rwanda. Methods
Twelve teams (309 players) were randomised in the intervention group and 12 teams (317 players) in the control group using a cluster randomized controlled trial with teams as the unit of randomization. Intervention group teams implemented the FIFA 11+ soccer specific warm-up programme during training and matches at least three times a week over seven months of the Rwandan soccer season. Control group teams continued with usual warm up exercises. The primary outcome of this study was the overall incidence of training and match injuries. Injuries, training and match exposure as well as severity categories were recorded per the F-MARC guidelines. Results
A lower proportion of players sustained injuries in the intervention group (52%) compared to the control group (63%) (Odd ratio: 0.7; 95%CI: 0.5–0.9). A significantly lower rate ratio was observed in the intervention group for overall (RR = 0.6; 95%CI: 0.5–0.8) and match (RR = 0.6; 95%CI: 0.5–0.8) injuries. Compliance to the injury prevention programme was 77%. In the intervention group, the incidence of injury was similar across all teams and across the medium and highly compliant teams. There was a statistically significant 55% and 71% reduction of the rate of moderate and severe injuries in the intervention group respectively. Conclusion
The 11+ warm up injury prevention programme resulted in a significant reduction in the odds of sustaining injuries. In addition, injuries sustained were less severe. The programme should be rolled out to all teams in Rwanda and may well result in a decrease in the incidence and severity of injury in similar contexts.
What is an elite level athlete? Is it someone who consistently wins competitions and can perform at the highest level day in and day out, or is it someone with extraordinary abilities to do things others can’t? I am sure we all have several names that come to mind when answering these questions. Usain Bolt, Michael Phelps, Floyd Mayweather, and Kobe Bryant are a few names that immediately came to mind for me. However, when thinking about becoming elite level athletes, we should not ask why they are at the top but rather how they made it to the top. What does it take to become an elite level athlete?
Sometimes we think they are where they are because of their exceptional talents, and there is nothing wrong with us thinking this. As humans, we tend to believe what we see and what we see is their performances in the ring, on the track, in the pool, or on the court. As a former elite-level swimmer, I can confidently say that these out-of-the-world performances are only the tip of the iceberg. So what goes on behind the scenes? Below are five things elite athletes do on their way to the top:
1. They Do Not Expect To Become A Superstar Overnight
… Yes, [Pete] Alonso’s absence was strange considering he went 5-for-13 with a home run, five RBI and three runs scored in his first three games back from the injured list. But the Mets’ reasoning for his day off had nothing to do with re-injuring his right hand, as many fans had speculated.
“He didn’t have a rehab assignment and he played three days in a row, one of those being an extra-inning game,” said Mets manager Luis Rojas on Thursday. “We just gotta give him the day off.”
The team’s answer for Alonso’s day on the bench is a strategy it will continue to utilize, not just to minimize setbacks, but to ensure players stay fresh for the grind of the baseball season.
There have been multiple calls made in the sport science literature for the promotion of interdisciplinarity to progress some of sports’ most prevailing challenges. Designing practice environments that support learning represents one such challenge, particularly given contemporary perspectives of skill acquisition and motor learning calls for coaches to realign their role—progressing toward the designers of practice tasks that promote athlete-environment interactions. In doing so, performers learn through exploration, deepening a relationship with their performance environment as they solve problems based on changing and interacting constraints. This paper illustrates an interdisciplinary approach to the area of learning through sport practice by adapting established principles embedded in video game designs. Specifically, 13 principles common to good video game designs are described, with practical examples of each provided across different sports. Fundamentally, this paper aims to offer sports practitioners with an overview and application of key principles that could support learning by design. Beyond this, the ideas presented here should further illustrate the value of interdisciplinarity in sports research and practice. [full text]
Google Research, SIGCHI; Nithya Sambasivan Shivani Kapania Hannah Highfill Diana Akrong Praveen Kumar Paritosh Lora Mois Aroyo from
AI models are increasingly applied in high-stakes domains like health and conservation. Data quality carries an elevated significance in high-stakes AI due to its heightened downstream impact, impacting predictions like cancer detection, wildlife poaching, and loan allocations. Paradoxically, data is the most under-valued and de-glamorised aspect of AI. In this paper, we report on data practices in high-stakes AI, from interviews with 53 AI practitioners in India, East and West African countries, and USA. We define, identify, and present empirical evidence on Data Cascades—compounding events causing negative, downstream effects from data issues—triggered by conventional AI/ML practices that undervalue data quality. Data cascades are pervasive (92% prevalence), invisible, delayed, but often avoidable. We discuss HCI opportunities in designing and incentivizing data excellence as a first-class citizen of AI, resulting in safer and more robust systems for all.
Skin-like health care patches (SHPs) are next-generation health care gadgets that will enable seamless monitoring of biological signals in daily life. Skin-conformable sensors and a stretchable display are critical for the development of standalone SHPs that provide real-time information while alleviating privacy concerns related to wireless data transmission. However, the production of stretchable wearable displays with sufficient pixels to display this information remains challenging. Here, we report a standalone organic SHP that provides real-time heart rate information. The 15-μm-thick SHP comprises a stretchable organic light-emitting diode display and stretchable organic photoplethysmography (PPG) heart rate sensor on all-elastomer substrate and operates stably under 30% strain using a combination of stress relief layers and deformable micro-cracked interconnects that reduce the mechanical stress on the active optoelectronic components. This approach provides a rational strategy for high-resolution stretchable displays, enabling the production of ideal platforms for next-generation wearable health care electronics. [full text]
Most anterior cruciate ligament injuries sustained by female soccer players are the result of a noncontact injury, not direct impact, a new study shows.
This may help explain why the rate of anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in this population continues to rise despite improvements in injury prevention programs, the researchers said. ACL injuries account for up to 43% of the total injury burden during the season.
In the study, “Systematic Video Analysis of Anterior Cruciate Ligament Injuries in Professional Female Soccer Players’,” published on May 14, 2021 in The American Journal of Sports Medicine, the researchers describe the mechanisms, situational pattern and biomechanics of ACL injuries in women’s soccer.
… Courtesy of the ground-breaking work of Professor Carlos Monteiro and others, we can now catalogue such manipulations of our food using the NOVA classification of processing. That, in turn, has enabled expert researchers in energy balance- notably, Kevin Hall at the NIH- to isolate and assess the effects of ultraprocessing. The result is as we all might have expected, and what those who designed “addictive junk food” in the first place already knew: ultraprocessing, independent of other considerations, increases the calories we consume. And so, ineluctably, increases our weight, too- because, in case you missed the memo, calories count.
Reflecting on, and fighting against, this uneven playing field my entire career – I have been inclined to equate obesity to drowning. A human body “drowns” not because there is anything wrong with the body- but because a perfectly normal, healthy human body, working as it should, just can’t stay under water for too long. We are not fish. Similarly, a perfectly normal, healthy human body cannot cope with an unending flood of willfully hyperpalatable calories and labor-saving technology. We can drown in those, as we can drown in water. We have been doing just that for years and decades. We have potent adaptations to protect us from starving; we have adaptations that help us use our muscles as required to survive. We have zero native defenses against caloric excess and the lure of the couch…never having needed those before; never, therefore, evolving them.
… While Intuitive Eating may seem like a recent concept, it has been around since 1995. And it is a model that has been validated by sufficient research. In fact, over 90 studies to date (this number is steadily increasing as people want to study it more) have been published on intuitive eating and its 10 principles. Much of this research links intuitive eating to positive benefits, such as greater life satisfaction, positive emotional functioning, greater body appreciation and satisfaction, and a greater motivation to exercise when focus is on enjoyment rather than guilt. Heath measures can improve, too, as research points to improved blood pressure, blood lipids and dietary intake.
Intuitive eating is also inversely associated with disordered eating traits and habits, something that has become relevant in the running community. A 2016 study funded by the National Collegiate Athletic Association Sport Science Institute found that intuitive eating practices among retired female athletes helped them to feel liberated in their eating, and for some, alleviated disordered eating practices they previously experienced.
In principle, intuitive eating challenges these rigid principles and all-or-nothing thinking. It is not a diet or food plan, and there is no counting calories, carbs, points or macros involved. Instead, intuitive eating takes away the rules that we see as “normal,” since we have been following them for so long. It is a journey of self-discovery, helping you learn to connect the needs of your body and mind and eat for pleasure and enjoyment (and health, too).
All of this may sound interesting and enticing, but how does it relate to you as a runner?
Last Friday, Monumental Basketball, the shared services department of the Washington Mystics, Wizards, Capital City Go-Go and Wizards District Gaming, announced that Dr. Katherine Evans will be their Vice President of Research and Information Systems. According to a press release, she will be in charge of data science on basketball operations. She is the first woman to lead such a department for an NBA team.
Evans comes to Monumental Basketball from the Toronto Raptors where she was the Director of Strategic Research from 2019-21. That role included building data models on individual NBA players and draft prospects. Before joining the Raptors, Evans was a Data Scientist for Verily Life Sciences right after she graduated with a Ph.D. in Biostatistics at Harvard University.
Instead of having his jersey soaked in champagne and being clouded by cigar smoke, LeBron James handed his uniform to Devin Booker, a trophy for the Phoenix Suns’ young star to take with him after he helped end what seemed like the longest season an NBA team has ever undertaken.
It’s been nearly 330 days since the Lakers arrived in Orlando for the league’s bubble experiment, a challenge they conquered. But with only 72 days separating the title celebration from its defense, the Lakers never felt like they started something new.
They spent this season merely trying to hang on to the glory they had.
“From the moment we entered the bubble to now, today, it’s been draining,” James said Thursday night after elimination from the playoffs. “Mentally, physically, spiritually, emotionally draining.”
In previous blog posts I explored the relationship between Premier League club’s salaries and team performance (here, here and here). The findings generally support the hypothesis set forth by Kuper and Szymanski that spending on players’ salaries is a better predictor of performance than net spending on transfers. Furthermore, these posts suggest managers of ‘inefficient’ teams tend to get fired while mangers of ‘efficient’ teams retain their roles. This post considers these issues by exploring the relationship between Premier League club’s spending on player salaries and team performance during the 2020/21 Premier League season.