The two-time Olympic gold medalist Caeleb Dressel was born to swim, but see how the American phenom has realised that there’s more to life than swimming as he races to the top. [video, 2:27]
Pascal Siakam improved more than anyone could’ve imagined last season, but the 76ers and Bucks were able to take advantage of one particular weakness in the playoffs. If he can turn it into a strength, there might be no stopping him.
… In sport science, statistics are probably one of our biggest assets, and one of our most important aspects when making decisions based on data (Buchheit., 2016). However, if our statistical skills are less than proficient, we may end up making decisions that may be incorrect, or send confusing messages to our key stakeholders. This potentially gives practitioner, coach and player little confidence in the data, the data collection process and/or sport science.
Whatever we monitor we must ensure that the tools we use for monitoring are repeatable (Reliability), measure what they are supposed to measure (Validity), sensitive enough to detect meaningful change in the player data (Sensitivity), and subsequently useful (Usability) for the coaches and/or players (depending on who you are feeding back too!)
Therefore, the aim of this blog is to provide an overview of each of the ‘Four Pillars of Confidence’ suggested by Dr. Thorpe, and provide example statistical methods that may allow us to make inferences based on our data to support coaches as opposed to snapshot decisions based on small data.
England players will need to get even fitter in order to win the next World Cup, according to Head of Team Strategy and Performance Dave Reddin.
The 50-year-old, who is leaving the Football Association at the end of the year, said great strides had been made on performance ahead of last summer’s World Cup in Russia, where England reached the semis.
He picked out individual profiling and “lower doses of work over a prolonged period” as significant areas of improvement by Head of Performance Bryce Cavanagh and his team before the competition.
He’s worked with some of the world’s top athletes and could fill an entire hand with his NBA championship rings, but the man tasked with keeping Kawhi Leonard healthy for the Raptors last season says winning the league’s trophy with Toronto was a special point in his career.
“From a personal standpoint, winning it as a Canadian was more important than anything,” Alex McKechnie, director of sports science and assistant coach with the Raptors, told reporters gathered at the B.C. Sports Hall of Fame in Vancouver on Tuesday.
The Scottish-born physiotherapist was inducted into the hall in 2018, recognizing his innovative work with an array of athletes, from NBA hall of famer Steve Nash and hockey superstar Paul Kariya to Olympic figure skater Michelle Kwan and English-Canadian soccer great Owen Hargreaves.
Just earlier this month Irish-based sports technology company Orreco, one of the leaders in the bio-analytical space, announced that they had signed a “significant” multi-year partnership with the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks. It turns out that that wasn’t the only news for the biomarker and performance company, as the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA) announced, earlier this week, that they will also be making Orreco their official bio-analytics provider.
Music is pounding. Neon lights are flashing all around me. I duck, dodge, and side-step, my hands lash out in every direction. But this isn’t some new martial arts fitness craze or a high-energy spin class. It’s a VR game called Beat Saber that I’m playing on the Oculus Quest headset. I’m working out in VR – and it’s fun.
Launched in May 2018, Beat Saber has quickly become one of the most popular VR games.
In March 2019, UploadVR reported that Beat Saber had officially sold one million copies, it’s garnered a huge online following and has even been featured on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon – if you’ve ever wondered how good Brie Larson is at wielding a saber, click the link to find out.
What’s more, according to TechCrunch, Beat Saber isn’t just driving lots of downloads and VR headset sales. Its popularity has also played a big part in developing the new Oculus Quest’s tracking system, ensuring new tech can handle the game’s most advanced modes.
At-home fitness hardware Pivot announced that it has raised $17 million in Series A funding. DCM led the round, with participation from Bling Capital, Founders Fund, Khosla Ventures, Signal Fire and Y Combinator.
As part of the investment, DCM Partner Kyle Lui will be joining the startup’s Board of Directors. Pivot plans to hire across engineering and operations teams in advance of its consumer launch this fall. The platform has live and recorded classes from premier group fitness trainers that users can stream directly to their Pivot device at home.
San Francisco-based Pivot uses advanced 3D sensors and machine learning to count every rep and track form in real-time for classes such as strength training, high intensity interval training (“HIIT”), cardio and more.
… Projections, which are admittedly somewhat conservative, expect there to be one 50-homer hitter at the end of the year (Cody Bellinger), as well as a handful of players with at least 40 homers. Even if we go by pace and the hitters hit exactly was well as they have up to this point, Bellinger and Yelich will have great seasons but fall a few homers shy of 60. Yelich and Hunter Renfroe are the only players on a 60-homer pace if they were to get to 700 plate appearances. While all the home runs being hit might make it seem like a 60-homer season should happen, the sheer number of homers in the game don’t actually dictate what the league leader might do. The graph below shows the average number of home runs by team per year along with the home run leader for that season.
Its exhibition schedule now less than two months from puck drop, the NHL will open for business in September with the same 20-man staffing levels it has employed for decades, with a limit of 18 skaters and two goalies per game.
Team payrolls, limited by the cap ($81.5 million for the upcoming season) are tailored, in part, around funding the 20-man game roster.
Across the NHL’s Original 31 rinks, benches are constructed to accommodate the 13 skaters and one backup goaltender . . . and little else other than water bottles, hockey tape, iPads, and vid screens. In fact, in a few cities, the backup tender is told there is no room at the inn and that he must find a seat in the runway leading to the dressing room.
In the way that former president Ernie Grunfeld had structured and managed the Washington Wizards’ hierarchy, there were few instances of subordinates afforded access to owner Ted Leonsis. Coaches and executives would come and go, but audiences without Grunfeld’s presence to filter interactions were rare.
This was why Leonsis didn’t know assistant general manager Tommy Sheppard well — nor how Sheppard imagined running the Wizards, nor how his deep roots in the international game could shape the Wizards’ global footprint. Grunfeld was fired in April, with Sheppard installed as interim GM, and the owner’s mandate to Sheppard on his internal candidacy for GM was simple: Don’t tell me, show me.
Data analytics have revolutionized sports, shaping the way decisions are made, teams are built and revenue is maximized. Leagues and teams have pioneered the use of massive troves of data, identifying the key data that affects performance. How do they do it? Will Ventures founder and former NFL player Isaiah Kacyvenski, Philadelphia 76′ers data scientist Ivana Seric, alongside sports journalist Bonnie Bernstein examine how data can be used to enhance a company’s strategy, identify market inefficiencies, gauge value, and optimize a workforce. [video, 20:22]
First, a brief overview. In the paper, we discuss three common misconceptions in sports biomechanics: 1) the interpretation of net joint forces as joint contact force; 2) treating scalars as vectors; and 3) misleading language pertaining weight and gravity 2/11