… As I slowly untangle the web I created for myself in order to sustain a 10-year professional career, I realize more and more the price I paid for “chasing my dream.” The constant emotional drain and energy expenditure goes much further than the time on the field or in team meetings, even. We are professional athletes, but above that, we are human beings. I thought I had created a path for myself that defied the logic of human existence. I could push and maximize and push some more and never look back. But the truth is, while pro athletes may defy logic in their performance, what happens inside us is very logical.
We certainly keep the secret of our full sacrifice hidden from the public. We hide it from our colleagues, and we even hide it from ourselves. And while it’s still a mystery to me how to untangle the web it’s created, what I know for certain is that this secret sacrifice is worth every second.
HealthLine, Timothy J. Legg, and Cathy Cassata from
Katelyn Ohashi, gymnast for UCLA, is no stranger to going viral for her showstopping floor routines. Not only does she wow with her impressive flips and moves, but the pure joy on her face and love for her sport is contagious to anyone watching.
Yet, Ohashi didn’t always feel this way about gymnastics. Once an Olympian hopeful, she recently spoke out about how the intense physical, mental, and emotional stress of the sport caused her to leave the Olympic world to compete at the collegiate level.
… USWNT coach Jill Ellis said Krieger has the potential to add depth at right back for the team. Typical right back Kelley O’Hara was left off the roster due to an ankle issue — she had surgery in October to remove loose bodies in her right ankle.
“I spoke with Ali and she’s excited to come into camp and help this team in any way she can,” Ellis said in a news release. “Opportunities, however they transpire, are exactly that, and Ali has been a great pro and will no doubt lean on her experience and strengths when she comes back into this environment. Recently, she has been training with her club in the outside back position and with the potential to add depth on the right side, it was good timing to bring Ali into this camp to join the other six defenders.”
It’s the Canadian Women’s Hockey League championship, but Calgary’s top American players took the game over and delivered the Inferno their second Clarkson Cup in four seasons.
Long-time Central Michigan University women’s gymnastics head coach Jerry Reighard is on paid leave as the school investigations allegations he urged an athlete to “provide false information to medical staff” in order to participate in competition.
It’s the latest instance of alleged suspect dealings pertaining to medical issues and training staff during Reighard’s 25-year tenure at Central Michigan, according to his 1,353-page personnel file, obtained and reviewed by The Detroit News through a Freedom of Information Act request.
The notable gaps in understanding and knowledge stem from the lack of research into female athletes, with studies seen by the English Institute of Sport [EIS] suggesting that as little as 3% of sports performance research has looked at training, recovery and the general wellbeing of female competitors.
“The majority of research findings in sports performance are only applicable to male athletes,” observes EIS.
“If we could adjust training, recovery, nutrition and the environment to account for specific female physiology and genetic profile, you could guarantee better performance outcomes for female health, wellbeing and performance.”
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers announced today the team has added Maral Javadifar as assistant strength and conditioning coach and Lori Locust as assistant defensive line coach. Locust and Javadifar are the first full-time female coaches in franchise history and the Buccaneers now become the first NFL team with two female coaches on staff.
As fog blankets the pitch on a Monday evening training session a group of Under-12 academy footballers strive to generate sharp passes, quick feet, clever movement. Everybody looks the part. This particular everybody, though, is not your standard issue elite group because in among the boys are Maddy and Laila, the two exceptional prospects from the Arsenal girls’ team who have been parachuted in to join a weekly session with the club’s boys.
Marcel Lucassen stands by the side of the pitch and watches. The Dutchman carries himself with the air of a man who can gladly talk in microscopic detail about football for 24 hours a day. He has been brought into the academy as the head of coach and player development, to oversee the culture of coaching from the five-year-olds all the way to Under-23s, bringing a bigger-picture vision to it all as he did for the German football federation for several years.
What does he think about this concept of inviting the best girls to train alongside the best boys? Lucassen is almost more interested in the notion of why that is a question rather than the question itself.
… unlike running apps that are native to a watch brand Strava can be used with a bunch of auto-syncing GPS devices or direct through your phone.
But isn’t it a men’s app? We hear you cry. Not exactly. It’s true that a higher proportion of users are men, but there were still over 150 million activity uploads from women last year.
So, with a number of lesser known integrations and features that are especially useful for fit females, we’re breaking down how you should be using it.
Results published in The American Journal of Sports Medicine showed a higher rate of new ACL injuries and other new knee injuries among female soccer players who underwent ACL reconstruction compared with knee-healthy controls.
Researchers matched 117 active female soccer players who had undergone ACL reconstruction with 119 knee-healthy female soccer players from the same teams. Researchers had players answer a web-based questionnaire that addressed players’ participation in soccer, new acute-onset or nontraumatic injuries to either knee or injury to other body locations six times during the 2-year follow-up. Researchers graded current activity level according to the Tegner Activity Scale at baseline and 2-year follow-up.
Anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) return-to-sport (RTS) test batteries are popular and are employed to test athletes’ sport performance and help ensure a safe return to sport. Objective
To perform a systematic review and meta-analysis to determine: (1) the proportion of patients who passed RTS test batteries after ACL reconstruction, (2) whether passing RTS test batteries increased rates of return to play, and (3) whether passing RTS test batteries reduced subsequent rates of knee and ACL injury. Methods
Five databases (PubMed, MEDLINE, Embase, CINAHL, and SPORTDiscus) were searched to identify relevant studies and data were extracted regarding the number of patients who passed the RTS test battery, as well as subsequent RTS rates and re-injury data when available. Results were combined using proportional and risk-ratio meta-analyses. Results
Eighteen studies met eligibility criteria. Proportional meta-analysis showed that only 23% of patients passed RTS test batteries. One study showed that passing an RTS test battery led to greater RTS rates. Two studies showed passing RTS test batteries did not significantly reduce the risk of a further knee injury (risk ratio (RR) = 0.28 (95% CI 0.04–0.94), p = 0.09) and five studies showed that passing RTS test batteries did not reduce the risk for all subsequent ACL injuries (RR = 0.80 (95% CI 0.27–2.3), p = 0.7). However, passing an RTS test battery did significantly reduce the risk for subsequent graft rupture (RR = 0.40 (95% CI 0.23–0.69), p < 0.001], although it increased the risk for a subsequent contralateral ACL injury (RR = 3.35 (95% CI 1.52–7.37), p = 0.003].
Conclusion
These analyses shows that there are equivocal findings in terms of the validity of current RTS test batteries in relation to reduction of the risk of graft rupture and contralateral ACL injuries. These findings have implications for RTS advice given to patients based on the results of RTS test batteries, and further work is needed to validate the criteria currently used and determine the true value.
Men and women can’t feel each other’s pain. Literally. We have different biological pathways for chronic pain, which means pain-relieving drugs that work for one sex might fail in the other half of the population.
So why don’t we have pain medicines designed just for men or women? The reason is simple: Because no one has looked for them. Drug development begins with studies on rats and mice, and until three years ago, almost all that research used only male animals. As a result, women in particular may be left with unnecessary pain—but men might be too.
Now a study in the journal Brain reveals differences in the sensory nerves that enter the spinal cords of men and women with neuropathic pain, which is persistent shooting or burning pain. The first such study in humans, it provides the most compelling evidence yet that we need different drugs for men and women.
As poor nutrition can negatively affect everything from bone to reproductive health, more attention needs to be paid to the specific nutritional needs of female athletes, a collaborative study from the University of Otago and University of Waikato argues.
Dr Katherine Black, of Otago’s Department of Human Nutrition, says most research into sport and nutrition focuses on male athletes, but the number of women participating in sport is growing, and female athletes have specific nutritional challenges and needs.
“They are not just male athlete adjusted for weight,” she says.
Sport England have discovered an early “gender gap” in attitudes and participation in sport and activity following major new research which underlines a particular need to get more young girls and women active.
The research complements Sport England’s Active Lives survey last year which showed that only 14 per cent of girls and 20 per cent of boys aged between five and 16 were meeting the Chief Medical Officer’s guidelines of more than 60 minutes of activity every day.
The new survey of 130,000 children found that, even between the ages of five and seven, girls were far less likely to take part in team sports but that more girls still said they loved being active. Simply having fun was the main incentive for all children to regularly take part in sport, although girls were found to be less likely than boys to say they enjoyed or felt confident about doing sport and physical activity.
… Last woman to win a World Cup not named Mikaela or Lindsey? To the way-back machine we go with Julia Mancuso in a city event in Moscow on Feb. 21, 2012. “Super Jules” also won a super-G in Garmisch that year. (The U.S. Ski Team should petition to have all future races in Germany, right?)
This is a way of saying that there is little if any depth on the U.S. Ski Team.
… The US has spent much of the last twelve months playing with a 4-3-3 in which the midfield is arranged as a single pivot with two more advanced midfielders in front of the pivot or “defensive” midfielder. That continued for most of the SheBelieves Cup but the US did at times switch to a 3-4-3. The switch was for short periods of time, especially in the game against Japan where the US started the second half in a back three and then abandoned it after about seven minutes.
The switch to back three may have been in response to the US facing two teams playing a 4-4-2 and may have been trying to create a 3v2 at the back. It may have also been because the US started every game with Crystal Dunn at left back, who is more comfortable in midfield and forward positions. The US also spent periods in more of a 4-2-3-1, opting to use a double pivot.
England legend Kelly Smith fears she will not see a female coach in charge of one of the country’s top division men’s teams in her lifetime, unless attitudes within boardrooms significantly change.
Smith enjoyed a 19-year international career with England and is the country’s record female goal scorer. She is delighted at how some aspects of the game are evolving — she recounts how she used to wear oversized men’s football kit when she started her England career — and is encouraged by the growing attendances for the women’s game, but fears the game is still playing catch-up when it comes to attitudes around females coaching in the men’s side of the game.
… Athletic gear has always been a niche market, tailored towards those who spend their evenings hitting the weights after work or training for various sporting events, professional or otherwise. The marketing for this area of clothing has featured fit models with visible abs and defined muscle. Until recently, there has been little call-out on this trend; society has collectively accepted that activewear represents fit people, and therefore marketing should follow suit. There is groupthink around the idea that all people want a six-pack and low body fat percentage.
The slim figures, oftentimes professional athletes themselves, reflect the sizing of the clothing offered by these brands. Until recently, Lululemon sold up to only a size 12 (they now sell up to a size 14) for women’s gear, limiting its audience. GymShark, an online brand, does offer sizes up to an XL, but the XL measurements are consistent with a US size 12. The statistics reflect this trend as well, showing that 67% of brands ignore women above a size 14.
