… “We’re used to seeing players go away after losing such a big lead,” explained Courtney Nguyen, a senior writer for WTA Insider who has been covering tennis for more than a decade. “Especially against Petra. Petra has these comebacks in the second set and then the third set is like, 6-0 or 6-1. She just runs away with it because you’re so demoralized.”
Osaka, on the other hand, is unique in her ability to rally herself after disappointments. And disappointed she was — she went into the locker room crying after losing the second set.
… “It’s just better now, knowing that if I go to work every day, work hard, get better at my job and learn everything I can in the occupation, that I’ll continue to progress,” said Johnson, now 29, who works as an emergency medical technician near his hometown of Fairfield, California, with hopes of joining a fire department. “Everything’s not based on my 40-yard dash.”
After Rafael Nadal breezed by Stefanos Tsitsipas in the Australian Open semifinals, the stunned 20-year-old described Nadal’s game as a “a different dimension of tennis completely.” Nadal had demolished Tsitsipas in straight sets, just like he had demolished each of his five previous opponents in straight sets. What Tsitsipas likely didn’t envision was Nadal, three days later, looking just as overmatched in the Australian Open final. If Tsitsipas was employing two-dimensional tennis on Thursday, then Novak Djokovic played Sunday’s final in four dimensions.
The foot has been considered both as an elastic mechanism that increases the efficiency of locomotion by recycling energy, as well as an energy sink that helps stabilize movement by dissipating energy through contact with the ground. We measured the activity of two intrinsic foot muscles, flexor digitorum brevis (FDB) and abductor hallucis (AH), as well as the mechanical work performed by the foot as a whole and at a modelled plantar muscle–tendon unit (MTU) to test whether these passive mechanics are actively controlled during stepping. We found that the underlying passive visco-elasticity of the foot is modulated by the muscles of the foot, facilitating both dissipation and generation of energy depending on the mechanical requirements at the centre of mass (COM). Compared to level ground stepping, the foot dissipated and generated an additional –0.2 J kg−1 and 0.10 J kg−1 (both p < 0.001) when stepping down and up a 26 cm step respectively, corresponding to 21% and 10% of the additional net work performed by the leg on the COM. Of this compensation at the foot, the plantar MTU performed 30% and 89% of the work for step-downs and step-ups, respectively. This work occurred early in stance and late in stance for stepping down respectively, when the activation levels of FDB and AH were increased between 69 and 410% compared to level steps (all p < 0.001). These findings suggest that the energetic function of the foot is actively modulated by the intrinsic foot muscles and may play a significant role in movements requiring large changes in net energy such as stepping on stairs or inclines, accelerating, decelerating and jumping. [full text]
Tibial stress fractures are a common overuse injury resulting from the accumulation of bone microdamage due to repeated loading. Researchers and wearable device developers have sought to understand or predict stress fracture risks, and other injury risks, by monitoring the ground reaction force (GRF, the force between the foot and ground), or GRF correlates (e.g., tibial shock) captured via wearable sensors. Increases in GRF metrics are typically assumed to reflect increases in loading on internal biological structures (e.g., bones). The purpose of this study was to evaluate this assumption for running by testing if increases in GRF metrics were strongly correlated with increases in tibial compression force over a range of speeds and slopes.
A new and extremely sensitive method of measuring ultrasound could revolutionise everything from medical devices to unmanned vehicles.
Researchers at The University of Queensland have combined modern nanofabrication* and nanophotonics* techniques to build the ultraprecise ultrasound sensors on a silicon chip.
Professor Warwick Bowen, from UQ’s Precision Sensing Initiative and the Australian Centre for Engineered Quantum Systems, said the development could usher in a host of exciting new technologies.
… Decades after Seattle led the way in portable ultrasound development, the technology has made the leap to sleek, handheld devices that can connect to a smartphone. Already, the cheaper, lightweight equipment is impacting lives throughout the world, from medical schools’ anatomy classes to isolated battlefields. Experts compare this development to the advent of tablets or smartphones in the computing world ― and they say we’ve only begun to see the implications of the mobile ultrasound era.
“This is a game-changer for people with limited resources to provide care,” said Dr. Michael Vrablik, an emergency medicine physician who works in ultrasound education at the University of Washington.
Increasingly, researchers say, ultrasound technology will be used not just for imaging but for actual treatment of disease. For example, ultrasound can create a force field akin to a “tractor beam,” to move objects around inside the body without invasive surgery, said Mike Bailey, a University of Washington associate professor and senior principal engineer in the UW’s Applied Physics Lab in the Center for Industrial and Medical Ultrasound.
Puck and player tracking is coming to the NHL next season. A sneak preview is coming up this weekend, too.
Commissioner Gary Bettman announced the long-expected news Friday during All-Star Weekend in San Jose, California, calling it a “breakthrough that is years in the making.” The league is partnering with German company Jogmo World Corp. to put microchips on player jerseys and inside game pucks. Real-time data will be gathered by antennas in all 31 NHL arenas.
The NHL joins the NFL as the two major North American professional sports leagues with wearable tracking technology. The NBA and Major League Baseball use sophisticated systems that can include radar and cameras.
“Being on the forefront of innovation is good for our game and most especially for our fans,” Bettman said. “With the speed and complexity of hockey, it makes for an unparalleled on-ice product, but at the same time it also presents an incredible challenge. So as a league we have made significant investment to create new technology that quite literally did not exist.”
Exertional heat illnesses (EHIs) among football athletes have been widely researched, but data examining all collegiate sports are limited. OBJECTIVE:
To describe the epidemiology of EHI in 25 National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) sports. DESIGN:
Descriptive epidemiology study. SETTING:
The NCAA Injury Surveillance Program during the 2009-2010 through 2014-2015 academic years. PATIENTS OR OTHER PARTICIPANTS:
A voluntary sample of 166 NCAA institutions over 2048 team-seasons. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S):
Athletic trainers reported EHIs to the NCAA Injury Surveillance Program. Only EHIs sustained during a sanctioned practice or competition were included. The EHI rate, specific diagnoses, and number of emergency transports were measured. RESULTS:
Overall, 232 EHI events were reported (0.47/10 000 athlete-exposures [AEs]; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.41, 0.53). Football comprised 75% of all EHI events and had the largest rate (1.55/10 000 AEs; 95% CI = 1.32, 1.78). The overall EHI rate was higher in preseason practices (1.16/10 000 AEs) than all other time periods (regular and postseason practices and all competitions; 0.23/10 000 AEs, injury rate ratio [IRR] = 4.96; 95% CI = 3.79, 6.50). This result was retained when examining the individual sports of football (3.65/10 000 versus 0.63/10 000 AEs, IRR = 5.82; 95% CI = 4.18, 8.10), men’s soccer (1.11/10 000 versus 0.07/10 000 AEs, IRR = 16.819; 95% CI = 1.89, 138.55), and women’s soccer (1.10/10 000 versus 0.05/10 000 AEs, IRR = 22.52; 95% CI = 2.77, 183.05). The EHI rates were highest in states with elevated annual temperatures (1.05/10 000 AEs). Heat cramps (39%), heat exhaustion (27%), and dehydration (29%) were the most common types of EHI. Nineteen athletes with EHI (8%) required emergency transport. CONCLUSIONS:
Football players continue to experience the most EHIs; however, EHIs can potentially occur in all NCAA sports. Continued emphasis on preseason EHI policies and institution-specific environmental guidelines is needed to address EHI rates.
People undertaking prolonged vigorous exercise experience substantial bodily fluid losses due to thermoregulatory sweating. If these fluid losses are not replaced, endurance capacity may be impaired in association with a myriad of alterations in physiological function, including hyperthermia, hyperventilation, cardiovascular strain with reductions in brain, skeletal muscle and skin blood perfusion, greater reliance on muscle glycogen and cellular metabolism, alterations in neural activity and, in some conditions, compromised muscle metabolism and aerobic capacity. The physiological strain accompanying progressive exercise-induced dehydration to a level of ~ 4% of body mass loss can be attenuated or even prevented by: (1) ingesting fluids during exercise, (2) exercising in cold environments, and/or (3) working at intensities that require a small fraction of the overall body functional capacity. The impact of dehydration upon physiological function therefore depends on the functional demand evoked by exercise and environmental stress, as cardiac output, limb blood perfusion and muscle metabolism are stable or increase during small muscle mass exercise or resting conditions, but are impaired during whole-body moderate to intense exercise. Progressive dehydration is also associated with an accelerated drop in perfusion and oxygen supply to the human brain during submaximal and maximal endurance exercise. Yet their consequences on aerobic metabolism are greater in the exercising muscles because of the much smaller functional oxygen extraction reserve. This review describes how dehydration differentially impacts physiological function during exercise requiring low compared to high functional demand, with an emphasis on the responses of the human brain, heart and skeletal muscles. [full text]
The NCAA’s board of governors has given initial approval to a measure aimed at preventing non-traumatic deaths in offseason workouts, Sporting News has learned. It is expected be enacted this spring following an amendment process.
The document outlines how schools should acclimate student-athletes into workouts following low-activity periods, which carry greater risk of injury or death because players have not yet adjusted to strenuous drills. It would also discourage the use of intensive workouts as a form of punishment, and establish how to properly diagnose and treat heatstroke.
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FILE – In this Nov. 8, 2018, file photo, a Pittsburgh Steelers fan holds a Le’Veon Bell jersey during the second half of an NFL football game between the Steelers and the Carolina Panthers in Pittsburgh. The steady exodus of mid-level veterans from the NFL is one element of a long-standing tension between players and the league over the structuring of contracts. The contract holdouts by Bell and Earl Thomas this season put the issue into vivid focus. (AP Photo/Don Wright, File)
By the time NFL players reach their third and fourth years in the league, the vast majority are struggling just to hang on because of injuries or younger, faster and often cheaper rookies out for their jobs.
In 2006 and 2011, the players union and the NFL tried to do something about that, adopting salary and bookkeeping rules with the potential to extend the careers of these veterans.
It hasn’t worked.
In a first-of-its-kind analysis, The Associated Press found that since 2005, the average amount of playing experience for athletes on the NFL’s opening-day rosters has shrunk from 4.6 years to 4.3.
… Through 23 games, there have been a total of 91 unused substitutes in the Premier League. While both Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp and his Manchester City counterpart Pep Guardiola have both complained about the fixture-bloat in the English game, neither one has used all 69 substitutions afforded to him this season.
The premier practitioners of juego de posicion and gegenpressing might have revolutionized the way the British game is played, but like most of the other managers in the Premier League, they’ve shown little desire to innovate against the idea of traditional substitution patterns.
Think of how the average Premier League game plays out. Depending on the manager, the first sub comes somewhere around the 60th minute. Then maybe there’s another sub somewhere around the 70-80 minute mark, and then potentially a third move in the dying moments of the match. Rarely does the strategy seem pre-planned, and most subs come on as an injury replacement, as a like-for-like swap for a player who’s performing poorly, or as a defense-for-offense or offense-for-defense exchange to either close a deficit or shut down a game.
It’s almost always reactive, rather than proactive.