Which is the most effective recovery method after a match?

www.ericcressey.com/

Players at high level may be required to play 2 matches per week. Although physically they can’t do it for many weeks, fast recovery is important to long-term team success. For this reason, several recovery methods are being used in soccer and other team sports to speed up recovery.

Cold-water immersion and contrast therapy, stretching, bike and pool active recovery, use of compression garments, rehydration and carbohydrate (CHO)-protein sports drinks, low-fat, high-CHO milk and others are among the methods used. In recent years there is a lot of research for most of them but not for all. Indeed, the use of some methods is based solely on empirical knowledge.

Bahnert et al’s study (2012): What this paper adds?

A recent study by Bahnert and colleagues from Adelaide FC and the University of South Australia investigated the effect of different recovery methods on post-game recovery and next match performance. A full squad of 44 elite footballers was monitored weekly across a 23-game season. Players were free to choose of different recovery methods, like cold-water immersion and contrast therapy, floor and/or pool stretching, bike active recovery, pool active recovery and the use of compression garments. Physical and perceptual recovery was evaluated during the week and a physical test, to assess performance, was conducted 2 days after the match. Records of match performance rating were kept throughout the season.

What is the novelty of the study

-Players were free to choose the recovery method

-Performance and recovery were assessed throughout the season in elite players

What they found

1. Players who chose cold-water immersion, floor stretching, no active recovery, and the use of compression garments were more possible to report improved mental and physical recovery after a match compared with the other recovery modalities.
2. No association between recovery method and 2-day post match physical test performance.
3. No association between the recovery method and match performance rating.

Take-home message

• Some recovery methods like cold-water immersion, floor stretching, no active recovery, and the use of compression garments are associated with faster perceptual recovery in a real-life set-up. Other methods don’t.
• Fast perceptual recovery with these methods might not necessarily result in faster physical recovery.

Next question

Should elite players allowed to choose the recovery method they prefer or not? Should sport scientists force them to use the recovery method they believe is more effective or let them choose?

Source & recent paper in football

Bahnert et al. Association between post-game recovery protocols, physical and perceived recovery, and performance in elite AFL players. Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport 2012 Jun 20 [Epub ahead of print].

Rupp et al. The effect of cold water immersion on 48-hour performance testing in collegiate soccer players. Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research 2012; 26: 2043–2050

Related posts in this blog

http://georgenassis.blogspot.gr/2011/12/low-fat-chocolate-milk-is-it-effective.html
http://georgenassis.blogspot.gr/2011/10/post-training-muscle-cooling-may.html
http://georgenassis.blogspot.gr/2011/07/omega-3-fatty-acids-supplementation-to.html

The 10-20-30 training concept for athletes and general population

It is well established in the literature that untrained individuals may improve their aerobic power with moderate to vigorous intensity continuous exercise training. For trained individuals, high intensity intermittent training (HIIT) has been shown to be beneficial for cardiac and, most importantly, muscular adaptations. Gibala and colleagues from the university of McMaster, Canada, developed a nice model of HIIT (Gibala et al., 2006). Last week I had the opportunity to watch the presentation by Professor Gibala during the congress of the European College of Sport Science at Bruges, Belgium. Professor Gibala showed data on the effect of 10 times 1-min bouts (95% of maximal heart rate) training on health. It is worth noting, however, that some athletes and especially non-athletes may not be able to sustain these 1-min bouts of high intensity. To increase compliance and consequently training-induced adaptations, Gunnarsson and Bagsbo (2012) from the University of Copenhagen presented the 10-20-30 training concept in a paper published this month in the Journal of Applied Physiology.

What is the training programme?

• The training programme consists of a 1.2 km warm-up at a low intensity followed by 3-4 times 5-min running with 2 min of rest between each bout. Each 5-min running period consists of repeated 30, 20, and 10 sec at intensities corresponding to <30%, < 60% and 90-100% of maximal intensity.
• Heart rate ranged between 82-87% of maximal in the 10-20-30 training group and averaged about 80% in the control group.
• Time spent at different heart rate zones were

                80-85% max: 3min in the 10-20-30 and 12min in the control group (CON)

                85-90% max: 6min in the 10-20-30 and 14min in CON

                >90%max: 13min the 10-20-30 and 0min in CON

What they found

1. VO2max increased in the 10-20-30 group but not in CON.
2. Performance in a 1,500-m and a 5-Km run improved by 21 and 48 sec, respectively in the 10-20-30 group. No change was found in the CON group.
3. Systolic blood pressure, total cholesterol and LDL were reduced in 10-20-30 but not in the CON group. These findings are of practical significance for at least two reasons. Firstly, other studies show no reductions in blood pressure with moderate intensity exercise in normotensive individuals (Dipla et al., 2012). Secondly, it is difficult to observe a significant lowering of total cholesterol levels with continuous sub maximal exercise at least in the majority of studies (Nassis et al., 2005).   As Gunnarsson and Bagsbo (2012) state “…further studies are needed to examine the cause of these changes in blood cholesterol".

Take-home message

High-intensity intermittent running (alternating between 30-95% of maximal speed) might be a practical and time efficient tool to improve endurance performance, blood pressure and blood lipids.

Few issue for your consideration

1)      To my opinion this training should compliment and not replace conventional training programmes. The reason is that we still now little about the effect of this programme on other aspects like muscle capillarization.

2)      We don’t know what happens with well trained athletes.

3)      Compliance is an issue especially in unhealthy population. Indeed t is very difficult, especially for untrained and non-healthy individuals, to run at 90-100% of maximal speed.

For more reading

Dipla, Nassis and Vrabas. Blood pressure control at rest and during exercise in obese children and adults. Journal of Obesity 147385, 2012.

Gibala et al. Short-term sprint interval versus traditional endurance training: similar initial adaptations in human skeletal muscle and exercise performance. Journal of Physiology 575: 901-911, 2006.

Gunnarson and Bangsbo. The 10-20-30 training concept improves performance and health profile in moderately trained runners. Journal of Applied Physiology 113: 16-24, 2012.

Nassis et al. Aerobic exercise training improves insulin sensitivity without changes in body weight, body fat, adiponectin, and inflammatory factors in overweight and obese girls. Metabolism 54: 1472-1479, 2005.

Human body has been designed to perform well when running without shoes



source: dw.world.de



Did you know that barefoot running might protect you from injuries? This is the result of the analysis published by the Harvard’s professor Daniel Lieberman. His first study was published in Nature in 2010 and the authors claimed that barefoot running may protect the lower leg from certain impact-related injuries.

The analysis showed that barefoot runners often land on the forefoot, sometimes with a flat foot but rarely on the heel. In the contrary, rear-foot landing is very common when wearing modern running shoes and this pattern of landing has been shown to create greater collision forces on the foot compared with the barefoot running.

Sources

Lieberman, Venkadesan, Werbel, Daoud, D’ Andrea, Davis, Mang’eri and Pitsiladis. Foot strike patterns and collision forces in habitual barefoot versus shod runners. Nature 463: 531-535, 2010.

Lieberman. What we can learn about running from barefoot running: an evolutionary medical perspective. Exercise & Sport Sciences Reviews 40: 63-72, 2012.

Hamstring injuries in soccer players: what’s new?

This week I read an ahead-of-print paper by van Beijsterveldt and colleagues (2012) which appeared in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports. This is a systematic review of the related studies with the aim to identify risk factors for hamstrings injuries in male adult soccer player.

What we already know

• Hamstring injuries are common and account 12-16% of all injuries in soccer (Arnason et al., 2004).
• Hamstring injuries may lead to an inability to play for up to 90 days and this might also be due to the high reinjury rate observed for this kind of injury.
• Usually, hamstring injury occurs during rapid acceleration, deceleration, change of direction or during the last part of the swing phase of gait.
• Potential risk factors for hamstring injuries are divided to intrinsic (age, previous injury, training history etc) and extrinsic (pitch type, environmental conditions etc).

What they found?

• After evaluating the quality of the related studies, and excluding those with low quality from their analysis, the authors concluded that previous hamstring injury is the most significant risk factor to hamstring injuries.
• Conflicting evidence exists on the role of hamstring length, hamstring flexibility and strength imbalances. In particular, some studies suggest that poor hamstring flexibility is a significant risk factor for hamstring injuries (Witvrouw et al., 2003) and others not (Engebretsen et al., 2010). The same holds for muscle strength imbalances (Croisier et al., 2008; Hagglund et al., 2006).

Related articles

• Arnason et al. Risk factors for injuries in football. Am J Sports Med 32: 5S-16S, 2004.
• Croisier et al. Strength imbalances and prevention of hamstring injury in professional soccer players: a prospective study. Am J Sports Med 36: 1469-1475, 2008.
• Engebretsen et al. Intrinsic risk factors for hamstring injuries among male soccer players: a prospective cohort study. Am J Sports Med 38: 1147-1153, 2010.
• van Beijsterveldt et al. Risk factors for hamstring injuries in male soccer players: a systematic review of prospective studies. Scand J Med Sci Sports 2012 Jun 21. doi: 10.1111/j.1600-0838.2012.01487.x. [Epub ahead of print].
• Witvrouw et al. Muscle flexibility as a risk factor for developing muscle injuries in male professional soccer players. A prospective study. Am J Sports Med 31: 41-46, 2003.

Playing football at altitude: analysis of the FIFA 2010 World Cup data



Johannesburg, a host city for the 2010 World Cup,
located at an altitude of 1753m (photo from FIFA.com)



As you may know altitude affects exercise performance in a negative way. Actually, the reduction in oxygen partial pressure in the atmospheric air, as a result of altitude ascent, reduces oxygen availability to the working muscles and finally reduces athletic performance. Most of the results refer to laboratory studies and very little information exists in football.

The negative effect of altitude is observed in endurance events. Sprint performance seems to be better at altitude and this is due to the reduced air density. The reduced air density at altitude might also affect, at some degree, flying objects characteristics. In football, this means that altitude might affect flying ball characteristics and thus the result.

The aim of the study attached below was to examine the effect of altitude on football performance using match analysis data from 2010 World Cup. Let me remind you that the FIFA 2010 World Cup was staged in South Africa from June 11^th to July 11^th, 2010 and matches were played at cities of varying altitudes (0-1753m).

If you want to learn more about the study and the findings please connect to the official site at

 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22648134

Some references for further study are also shown below.

Hope you enjoy the reading.

References

• Bartsch et al. Consensus statement on playing football at different altitude. Scand J Med Sci Sports 18: 96-99, 2008.
• Gore et al. Preparation for football competition at moderate to high altitude. Scand J Med Sci Sports 18: 85-95, 2008.
• Gore et al. Reduced performance of male and female athletes at 580m altitude. Eur J Appl Physiol 75: 136-43, 1997.
• Hamlin et al. Simulated rugby performance at 1550-m altitude following adaptation to intermittent normobaric hypoxia. J Sci Med Sport 11: 593-599, 2008.
• Levine et al. Effect of altitude on football performance. Scand J Med Sci Sports 18: 76-84, 2008.
• McSharry PE. Altitude and athletic performance: statistical analysis using football results. BMJ 335: 1278-1281, 2007.
• Perronet et al. Theoretical analysis of the effect of altitude on running performance. J Appl Physiol 70: 339-404, 1991.
• Wehrlin et al. Linear decrease in VO_2max and performance with increasing altitude in endurance athletes. Eur J Appl Physiol 96: 404-412, 2006.

Are there genetic biomarkers to predict adaptability to training?

The study of genetic contribution to exercise training adaptation has emerged over the last years in an attempt to identify possible genes that regulate adaptability to training or trainability. These studies aimed to improve knowledge on effective health-related interventions and, hence, were on general population or unhealthy individuals (McPhee et al., 20120; Timmons et al., 2005).  However, information from these studies might shed more light into the potential molecular mechanisms explaining the observed large variability in training adaptations. Accordingly these findings might contribute in improving our understanding on why some players improve more than others.

Indeed, variability in maximum aerobic power improvement after training has been reported to range from 0% to >100% (Timmons et al., 2010). This means that some individuals show a big improvement whereas others no improvement at all. Causes of this wide range of inter-individual variability are poorly understood. Timmons et al. (2010) in his pioneer study has identified key genetic links to such variation. The authors defined a 29-gene expression signature in untrained skeletal muscle that explained >50% of the variance in VO2max improvements due to training.

One year later, Professor Claude Bouchard, a leader in genetics, identified genomic predictors of the response of VO2max to regular exercise. Interestingly, these genomic predictors were different from those presented by Timmons et al (2010). In Bouchard’s study, subjects who carried <9 favorable alleles at these 21 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) improved their VO2max by 221 ml/min whereas those who carried >19 of these alleles improved by 604 ml/min. The 21 SNPs identified as predictors explained 49% of the variance in VO2max trainability. Although, the pre-training absolute values are not presented in this paper these results explain why there is such variation in human adaptive response to exercise training.

Conclusions and practical applications

1. From these studies it appears that part of the variation in adaptation to exercise originates from variation in gene sequence that influences the complex cascade of biochemical events leading to adaptations to training.
2. If there are genetic predictors of adaptation to training this means that in the future we might be able to select among talented players those with “high trainability”. We might also be able to create more effective training regimes for “low responders” but skilled players.

Points to consider before final conclusions

• Studies so far have been conducted with white, non-elite athletes. We know very little for athletes and especially non-whites.
• Most of the information is on VO2max although some data exist on resistance training adaptations. There is very limited information on other fitness attributes that have high impact on football performance.
• As the authors of these papers acknowledge the relatively small sample size for this kind of research is a limitation of these studies. This however does not undermine, in my opinion, their significant contribution in advancing our current knowledge.

References

Bouchard et al. Genomic predictors of the maximal O2 uptake response to standardized exercise training programs. Journal of Applied Physiology 110: 1160-1170, 2011.

McPhee et al. Inter-individual variability in adaptation of the leg muscles following a standardized endurance training programme in young women. European Journal of Applied Physiology 109:1111-1118, 2010.

Petrella et al. Potent myofiber hypertrophy during resistance training in humans is associated with satellite cell-mediated myonuclear addition: a cluster analysis. Journal of Applied Physiology 104: 1736-1742, 2008.

Timmons et al. Human muscle gene expression responses to endurance training provide a novel perspective on Duchenne muscular dystrophy. FASEB 19:750-760, 2005.

Timmons et al. Using molecular classification to predict gains in maximal aerobic capacity following endurance exercise training in humans. Journal of Applied Physiology 108: 1487-1496, 2010.

Science in Football: what’s next?

Last week I was in Ghent (Belgium) for the 3^rd World Conference on Science and Soccer. It was a 2-day productive gathering of sport scientists working in soccer. I had the opportunity to listen some good lectures and presentations on various aspects of soccer performance (physiology, performance analysis, physiotherapy etc). Last week gave me also the time to think more and evaluate the current situation.

We all realize that the number of scientific papers published in peer-reviewed journal has increased in the past years. This is due to the increasing i) number of scientists involved, and ii) interest of sport scientists in the area of soccer. However, I am wondering if this growing number of studies has made a substantial impact and resulted to some important changes in every day practice in the football clubs. I have posted my thoughts on this issue and I don’t want to add more. If you have more interest you can read previous posts

• How much science is enough? http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2012/01/how-much-science-is-enough.html
• the role of sport scientist in a club http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2012/04/be-unique-and-effective-in-your-role.html

What’s next?

In this post my concern is on the future. What’s next? What is missing in applied sport science to become more effective in influencing every day practice in a club? Firstly, I think there are certain areas, with important practical applications, for which we know very little. For example

-Which are the more effective injury prevention strategies?

-effective training programs to improve match performance?

-a realistic periodization model to support short and long-term player’s development?

To answer some of these questions we need more realistic approaches. Most studies in the literature have been conducted with healthy adults, university students practicing football or amateur players, but not with football players! Protocols are relatively rigorous, conditions well or very well controlled, stimulus “isolated”. No doubt, we need controlled conditions to conduct valid experimental research. Do we need very much “isolated” stimulus? For instance, to study the effect of plyometric training on power we might apply 2-3 training sessions (20-30min each) 3 times per week for 8 weeks. In real life, players never train 20-30min per session. In addition, endurance training might follow power training in the same session. What is the interaction of the different training methods in a single session? What is the effect of combined power and endurance training in the short- and long-term development of the player? I address some practical questions for which the answer is: we don’t know!

In my opinion, there is a lot to be done before we can give clear and valid answers to the coaches. To start with, I think we should start planning our research with clear focus on practical questions.

What readers like most

It has been a year since the first post appeared in the blog. So far, I enjoyed posting and reading your comments. Thank You for your kind interest in the blog’s content. I really appreciate your comments.

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Most readable posts

Effect of eccentric training on hamstring injuries prevention in football players
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/11/effect-of-eccentric-training-on.html

The role of sport scientist in a team
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2012/04/be-unique-and-effective-in-your-role.html

How much science is enough?
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2012/01/how-much-science-is-enough.html

How to increase first step speed in football players
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/10/effect-of-plyometric-training-on-first.html

Speed, agility, quickness (SAQ) training method: what’s new?
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/10/speed-agility-quickness-saq-training.html

The role of sport scientist in a team

Today, I would like to share with you my experience in working in a high level football club, as is Panathinaikos FC. I have been in football for years initially as a freelance professional and in the past 5 years as the head of Panathinaikos FC Performance Lab. In the past years I worked with high performance players like Gilberto Silva, George Karagounis , Djibril Cisse, Seb Letto, Jean Allen Boumsong and others. I have also worked with great head coaches like Jesualdo Ferreira, Henk Ten Kate, Nioblias, Jose Peseiro and assistance coaches and fitness trainers (Jose Gomes , Xristof Vazexa, Lau Ebben, Stergios Fotopoulos, Pedro Cainhinxa & Jose Eduardo). The names are in chronological order and I apologize if I have forgot someone. It has been a wonderful experience for me.

All these years, I had the opportunity to interact with high level professionals. With some of them I have developed a friendly relationship. Gentlemen, thank you all for this fantastic experience!

What have I learned these years?

• MUTUAL RESPECT. As a sports scientist I always respected the role limits. This helped me to establish a good relationship with coaching and medical staff. CLARITY OF ROLES is very important for high level performance. Don’t ask for respect. Receive it with your high work quality.
• SHOW THE TEAM WHAT YOU CAN DO FOR THEM. This is very important to receive their respect!
• AVOID CONFUSION. Each member of the team has a clear role and can express his/her opinion. Whatever he/she says must be based on his/her expertise. The head coach manages the team and makes final decisions.
• HIERARCHY. This is set by the Club and is a good tool for everyday effective practice. When join the Club, you should fit to the role. Don’t try to change the role to fit your ambitions!
• BE CLEAR IN YOUR COMMUNICATION. Coaches and players are not scientists. They might not know the specific terms. It is our job to help them understand. To do so
• SPEAK THEIR LANGUAGE
• AVOID TOO MUCH INFORMATION AT THE SAME TIME
• DO NOT OVERDO IT. Football is football and science is there, as a tool, to help players improve faster and further.
• IF THEY DON’T LISTEN FIND ANOTHER WAY. If you want to know how, please read this post http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/06/say-it-in-different-way-power-of-words.html
• FOOTBALL IS A TEAM SPORT. Think, communicate, be open, flexible and team player.
• DO NOT COMPROMISE QUALITY OF WORK-SET HIGH LEVEL GOALS.
• WORK SMART. Our job is to assist coaches develop more effective training programs. Hard work is not necessarily the most effective way. Spend time to achieve the right mixture of science and practice. If you want to learn more please click on http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2012/01/how-much-science-is-enough.html

Key messages

• Build mutual respect
• Follow the smart way
• Be a team player

Hope you enjoyed the reading. The post is open to discussion. Please feel free to comment. Before doing that, may I ask you to introduce yourself?

Thank you and best regards

George

Effect of a structured warm up programme on injuries prevention

The effect of a revised programme on lower extremity injury rate was examined in 65 female clubs in Norway over one playing season (8 months). Sixty clubs served as the control group.

Intervention

An expert group organized by FIFA with representatives from the Oslo Sports Trauma Research Center, the Santa Monica Orthopedic and Sports Medicine Research Foundation, and the FIFA Medical Assessment and Research Centre developed a warm up programme for injury prevention. The programme has 3 parts

• Running exercises (about 8 minutes)
• Strength, plyometrics and exercises for balance (about 10min)
• Running exercises (about 2 minutes)

Exercises were adapted to the level of players and are shown below.

Source: FIFA website.

What we have learned from this study

• In the group that received the injury prevention programme, a lower risk of injuries overall, overuse injuries and severe injuries was recorded in one playing season.
• It is worth noting that the risk of injury was decreased by about 1/3 and the risk of severe injury by about 1/2 with this warm up programme.

Source

Soligard et al (2008). Comprehensive warm-up programme to prevent injuries in young female footballers: cluster randomized controlled trial. BMJ 337:a2469.

Loughborough University: the place where people "learn to win"

As an ex Loughborough student, I am very pround for the significant role that our University is currently playing in the preparation for the 2012 Olympic Games. Loughborough is indeed the place to study sports science and train for elite sports. As you may know Loughborough is now a Centre of Execellence for many sports. Many elite players use its state-of-the art facilities for their preparation for the Games.

Read what people say about their experience at Loughborough:

 "Loughborough is the best place to prepare... Everything is here: the facilities, the physios, the coaches, they've got a great medical team, so everything is perfect for my training." Laura Whittingham, Javelin thrower.


"... we want to create a place where people learn to win in all walks of life." Chris Earle, Loughborough's director of sport

To read more about the role of Loughborough in 2012 Olympic Games preparation please visit THE INDEPENDENT (24 March 2012)

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/olympics/olympics-britains-secret-success-factory-7578100.html

Novel tests to evaluate muscle injury risk in professional football players



Source: au.eurosport.com



Muscle imbalance and in particular of the legs is considered as a risk factor for injuries in football players. To evaluate muscle strength and imbalances most practitioners use isokinetic dynamometry. However, there are a number of factors that limit the use of isokinetic dynamometry in a large number of players and thus threaten its practical applicability. The high cost of the isokinetic device, the time required to test one player (15-20 min) and the skills required by the examiner are some of them.

Hand held-dynamometers are simple devices that require no high expertise from the experimenters. Rod Witheley and his colleagues from Aspetar Orthopaedic and Sports Medicine Hospital, Qatar, published a very nice study few days ago which compares novel hand-held dynamometry tests results of knee flexion and extension with isokinetic dynamomery. Their study population was 216 male professional football players.

Their results showed:

·         Medium to high correlation between hand-held dynamometry measures and results from isokinetic dynamometry.

·         Reliability for the eccentric hamstrings, isometric hamstrings, and isometric quadriceps measures was excellent with the hand-held dynamometer.

Another strong point of the study is thepublication of normative data for hand-held dynamometry measures from a large sample of professional football players.

In my opinion, the novel measures with hand-held dynamometer described in the paper of Whiteley and colleagues will help a lot in the evaluation of football players since:

·         Measures are reliable and take only 4-5 min

·         The cost of the hand-held dynamometer is low, and

·         No specific skills are required

Reference

Whiteley et al (2012). Correlation of isokinetic and novel hand-held dynamometry measures of knee flexion and extension strength testing.  Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport, Mar 15. [Epub ahead of print]

Trainability in childhood and adolescence

Most coaches design their training programs based on players' chronological age. However, this is not the most effective way since biological maturation will affect many fitness-related components in athletes. Thus, coaches should train their players based on biological rather than chronological age. A good indicator of players maturity stage is the onset of Peak Height Velocity (PHV) or the age (A) at which players gain height rapidly. The average age for PHV is around 14 for boys although it varies widely and is affected by genes, environment etc. Before the APHV, boys could be trained based on their chronological age. After this age however, players should be trained based on their biological age.

The Long Term Athlete/Player Development Model (LTADM) is a general plan of training in children and adolescents. The LTADM was developed by  Balyi, British Columbia, Canada.

The LTADM describes five stages for players’ development:

1. Fundamental stage (6-9 years)
2. Learning to Train (9-12 years)
3. Training to Train (12-16 years)
4. Training to Compete (16-18 years)
5. Training to Win (18+ years)

Below you can read a summary of the training targets and means for each of these stages.

BACK TO THE BASICS

 

We are living in an era of “accelerated knowledge”. We receive new, excited information that promises to make our professional life better. Have you heard about the “magic” water, the legal substances that “can boost performance”, the new training methods that will maximize training adaptations?

Much of this information lacks scientific support. The fact that something is perceived as good by a player or a coach does not mean that it can improve performance for all. Have you heard about the placebo effect? If you think that a substance or a strategy will improve performance it may actually do so without any biological effect. More importantly, it may not work the second time!

 Looking and hearing about all these I am wondering: Do we miss the basics?

Basics in training

The principles of training are:

-Specificity: In order to maximize the benefits, especially at high level, players should train with methods, exercises and speed of execution specific to their positional needs. For instance, sprint types and training structure should be planned based on match analysis (distances, intervals etc).

-progressive overload: To ensure long-term improvement training should be hard enough to stimulate adaptations but light enough to avoid over-training. Training plans should also incorporate resting periods/days to maximize adaptations (Figure 1).

Figure 1. The overload principle (source: roadcycling.uk.com)

-Reversibility or detraining: without suitable training players will lose the fitness gains.

-Individual response: To maximize performance training must be based on individual player’s needs. I would suggest a more individual approach to training planning. No matter what method you use, modern or conventional, if you ignore player’s needs you miss the point.

Think and design based on player needs

This is my conclusion so far. To maximize the benefits one must use the method, means and techniques that fit the specific situation (club, players etc). In my professional life I am always looking for scientifically proved information and try to think in a simple and clear way. This does not mean a simplistic way!

To my belief we should not forget the obvious. Sometimes the solution to the problem is in front of us but we are not able to see it. Why? Because we might spend a lot of our time looking for new, more and more attractive information. We spend our time searching and not thinking!

A different analysis of van Persie's goal

Have you watched Arsenal's win against Liverpool today? Have you watched the goal by Robin van Persie at 92th min? (http://www.arsenal.com/home)
This is football!

Besides, fitness and tactical aspects it is also the player's ability to be at the right place at the right moment to make the right action!

To read more about it please visit http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/10/be-at-right-place-at-right-moment-to.html

BIOMARKERS OF TOP PERFORMERS
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/06/biomarkers-of-top-performers.html

TOP 5 POSTS ON SCIENCE AND FOOTBALL

How much science is enough?
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2012/01/how-much-science-is-enough.html

Effect of eccentric training on hamstring injuries prevention http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/11/effect-of-eccentric-training-on.html

How to increase first step speed in football players?
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/10/effect-of-plyometric-training-on-first.html

Speed, agility, quickness (SAQ) training method: what’s new?
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/10/speed-agility-quickness-saq-training.html

A soccer-specific neuromuscular training program to reduce injuries in young players
http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/10/soccer-specific-neuromuscular-training.html

We see what we want to see

Sometimes we can easily miss what is right in front of us. We might miss the obvious! 


It might be because we usually concentrate so much in something that we miss other more important stuff. Usually we see what we want to see and we have no idea of what we have missed.


The video attached in this post is based on a famous experiment of Drs Dan Simons and Chris Chabris.
Watch the video below
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGQmdoK_ZfY


If you want to read more please visit http://neuronarrative.wordpress.com/2010/07/27/did-you-see-the-gorilla-an-interview-with-psychologist-daniel-simons/

Is football performance affected immediately following local cooling?

Local cooling by application of ice or pre-exercise lower body cooling is a common practice in competitive football (http://georgenassis.blogspot.com/2011/10/post-training-muscle-cooling-may.html). Is performance affected by the use of these methods? How safe is it for the player when returning to the pitch?

A nice review article by Bleakly and colleagues (2012) has summarized the research findings in this area. Here are the main conclusions:

• The majority of studies show a reduction in muscle strength immediately following cooling.
• There is evidence than cooling negatively affects running speed, power and agility. However, this decline was alleviated with a short warm up.
• Effect of cooling on endurance is not clear with some studies showing negative and some others positive effects. Those with positive effects asked subjects to exercise in the heat immediately after pre-cooling.

Points to consider when interpreting these findings

• Cooling was mainly achieved with >20min of cold water immersion.
• Performance remained below baseline for about 15min following cooling.
• Effect of cooling on performance is affected by several factors such as limb adiposity.
• There is very limited, if any, information in the literature on the effect of cooling on football skill performance.

For more reading

Bleakley et al. (2012). Should athletes return to sport after applying ice? Sports Medicine 42: 69-87.