They are world and Olympic champions, record-breakers and global activists with decades of experience being at the top of their game. These female athletes share what drives them, what’s important to excel in your chosen sport or career and how to share your passions and success with others.
Sally Kipyego was born in Kenya but came to the U.S. to attend South Plains College, where she won seven NJCAA titles, before moving on to Texas Tech, where she added a record-tying nine NCAA titles. Kipyego earned silver medals in the 10,000m at the 2011 world championships and the 2012 Olympic Games for Kenya. She became a U.S. citizen in 2017, and became a mother later that year (after infamously finishing second at the 2016 New York City Marathon while she was unknowingly pregnant).
Kipyego, 34, has been open about her challenging return to fitness after giving birth, but in February, she proved herself to be one of the best marathoners in the U.S., finishing third at the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials in Atlanta, where she earned a spot on the U.S. Olympic team.
We caught up with Kipyego by phone last week, from her farm on the outskirts of Eldoret, Kenya.
Roberto Firmino battled the odds to become a Premier League and European champion at Liverpool, after making a miraculous journey from Maceio to Merseyside via a five-year spell in Germany. FFT retells the remarkable tale with those who were part of it
The 2-7 Los Angeles Chargers are not having an amazing season. That having been said, their rookie quarterback Justin Herbert is doing an impressive job under center. He’s being touted as the front-runner for offensive rookie of the year, and if you’ve got him on your fantasy team, you’re probably doing a little dance every Sunday. The issue seems to be on the other side of the ball—the Chargers are excelling at blowing leads. Still, the former Oregon Duck says he’s just grateful to be doing what he loves every single day.
“I’m honored to be playing for a great organization,” he says. “Every week is another opportunity to play the game and I’m ready to get after it.” GQ caught up with him recently to chat about his diet, which involves lots of team-catered meals and a steady rotation of fast-food sub sandwiches.
When Graeme Jones sat down in his new office on day one as Head of High Performance for the SFA, it was the beginning of a quiet revolution for Scotland.
At that point, in October 2017, his department consisted of one doctor, a sports scientist and a physio. There was no GPS and no data analysis.
Fast forward three years, to David Marshall’s penalty heroics and the players conga-ing around their breakfast tables in a Belgrade banquet hall, and it’s viva la revolution.
“Now the environment is right and the chemistry between the players, coaches and support staff is right,” Jones, who has been with the SFA for five years in total, tells TGG. “If we hadn’t won the other night that would still be the case.
… While heart rate refers to the number of times your heart beats per minute, heart rate variability (HRV) measures the time between each heartbeat. Also known as an R-R interval, this beat-to-beat interval variation is measured in milliseconds and can vary depending on a number of factors.
For instance, the interval between heartbeats is generally longer on your exhales and shorter when you inhale. So even if your heart rate is 60 beats per minute, the time between these beats is rarely one exact second. Within the same minute, you could have a 0.8-second interval between one set of heartbeats and then a 1.13-second interval between another set.
This probably seems overly scientific and perhaps not that useful for the everyday amateur athlete. However, being able to answer the question ‘what is HRV?’ can in fact provide you with important information about your overall health and the progression of your current training plan.
Sleep is essential for recovery of the brain and body, yet many athletes have problems falling asleep or may wake up during the night, then wake up in the morning not well rested.
A new critical review was published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine this week, in which a number of experts evaluate the evidence on sleep for athletes. Here is an interview with 2 of those authors: Dr Shona Halson and Prof Neil Walsh.
… The key idea that [Andrew] Best starts with is what’s known as the principle of training specificity, which basically says that your body adapts to get better at handling whatever stresses you impose on it. If you lift heavy weights, you develop bigger muscles and get better at lifting heavy weights. If you run long distances, you develop a stronger heart and mitochondria-rich muscles that make you better at running long distances. The idea that strength training makes you a faster runner seems to violate the principle of training specificity. Why is it that simply running a lot, on its own, doesn’t seem to produce the optimal adaptations for running?
Harvard University, John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences from
… “Current soft strain gauges are really sensitive but also really fragile,” said Oluwaseun Araromi, a Research Associate in Materials Science and Mechanical Engineering at SEAS and the Wyss Institute and first author of the paper. “The problem is that we’re working in an oxymoronic paradigm — highly sensitivity sensors are usually very fragile and very strong sensors aren’t usually very sensitive. So, we needed to find mechanisms that could give us enough of each property.”
In the end, the researchers created a design that looks and behaves very much like a Slinky.
“A Slinky is a solid cylinder of rigid metal but if you pattern it into this spiral shape, it becomes stretchable,” said Araromi. “That is essentially what we did here. We started with a rigid bulk material, in this case carbon fiber, and patterned it in such a way that the material becomes stretchable.”
Researchers have developed an ultrathin pressure sensor that can be attached directly to the skin. It can measure how fingers interact with objects to produce useful data for medical and technological applications. The sensor has minimal effect on the users’ sensitivity and ability to grip objects, and it is resistant to disruption from rubbing. The team also hopes their sensor can be used for the novel task of digitally archiving the skills of craft workers.
There are many reasons why researchers wish to record motion and other physical details associated with hands and fingers. Our hands are our primary tools for directly interacting with, and manipulating, materials and our immediate environments. By recording the way in which hands perform various tasks, it could help researchers in fields such as sports and medical science, as well as neuroengineering and more. But capturing this data is not easy.
Objective Investigate the incidence and burden of injuries by age group in youth football (soccer) academy players during four consecutive seasons.
Methods All injuries that caused time-loss or required medical attention (as per consensus definitions) were prospectively recorded in 551 youth football players from under 9 years to under 19 years. Injury incidence (II) and burden (IB) were calculated as number of injuries per squad season (s-s), as well as for type, location and age groups.
Results A total of 2204 injuries were recorded. 40% (n=882) required medical attention and 60% (n=1322) caused time-loss. The total time-loss was 25 034 days. A squad of 25 players sustained an average of 30 time-loss injuries (TLI) per s-s with an IB of 574 days lost per s-s. Compared with the other age groups, U-16 players had the highest TLI incidence per s-s (95% CI lower-upper): II= 59 (52 to 67); IB=992 days; (963 to 1022) and U-18 players had the greatest burden per s-s: II= 42.1 (36.1 to 49.1); IB= 1408 days (1373 to 1444). Across the cohort of players, contusions (II=7.7/s-s), sprains (II=4.9/s-s) and growth-related injuries (II=4.3/s-s) were the most common TLI. Meniscus/cartilage injuries had the greatest injury severity (95% CI lower-upper): II= 0.4 (0.3 to 0.7), IB= 73 days (22 to 181). The burden (95% CI lower-upper) of physeal fractures (II= 0.8; 0.6 to 1.2; IB= 58 days; 33 to 78) was double than non-physeal fractures.
Summary At this youth football academy, each squad of 25 players averaged 30 injuries per season which resulted in 574 days lost. The highest incidence of TLI occurred in under-16 players, while the highest IB occurred in under-18 players.
The athlete gut microbiome differs from that of non‐athletes in its composition and metabolic function. Short‐term fitness improvement in sedentary adults does not replicate the microbiome characteristics of athletes. The objective of this study was to investigate if sustained fitness improvement leads to pronounced alterations in the gut microbiome. This was achieved using a repeated‐measures, case‐study approach that examined the gut microbiome of two initially unfit volunteers undertaking progressive exercise training over a 6‐month period. Samples were collected every two weeks and microbiome, metabolome, diet, body composition, and cardiorespiratory fitness data were recorded. Training culminated in both participants completing their respective goals (a marathon or Olympic‐distance triathlon) with improved body composition and fitness parameters. Increases in gut microbiota α‐diversity occurred with sustained training and fluctuations occurred in response to training events (e.g., injury, illness and training peaks). Participants’ BMI reduced during the study and was significantly associated with increased urinary measurements of N‐methyl nicotinate and hippurate, and decreased phenylacetylglutamine. These results suggest that sustained fitness improvements support alterations to gut microbiota and physiologically‐relevant metabolites. This study provides longitudinal analysis of the gut microbiome response to real‐world events during progressive fitness training, including intercurrent illness and injury.
Theo Epstein said he was interested in a baseball job that allows him to help address some of more existential threats to the game. So I asked him what he thinks those are
Athletic ability, like race, is one of several factors in Harvard s admissions. A Supreme Court ruling that forces Harvard to restructure how they evaluate applicants could impact how all schools value athletic achievements.