Sports Science, the open secret to getting faster, bigger, stronger

It’s a constant cycle that helps the powerlifter with the right amount of power while aiming for a second Olympic medal. In Chennai, table tennis player Sharath Kamal, 42, has monitored his heart rate for more than two decades, making his training a continuous advance in sports science. To say that Sharath’s long life is a direct result of his scientific prowess apart from his unquestionable talent would not be far-fetched.

At the Inspire Institute of Sports (IIS) in Bellary, sports scientists thought that the best way to get Olympic javelin champion Neeraj Chopra closer to hitting the 90m mark was to add his strength by “10-15 percent” this year. So the 26-year-old has worked hard in the gym – heavy enough to increase his throwing range but light enough not to compromise his swimming. The speed of the bar is recorded, and progress is monitored, leading to incremental millisecond gains that will hopefully translate to more centimeters in competition.

In table tennis and darts, robots with the best in the world are not an uncommon sight. In the field of shooting, static jackets have played an increasingly important role in the number of shots that are rising as experts work overtime to simulate the tension of sports to prepare athletes for the perfect shot under a strong competitive pressure.

At the core of the preparation and training of these elite athletes are valuable data tools that are analyzed through a combination of human and machine intelligence before developing the most powerful way to improve their game.

With parameters such as VO2 max, lactates and electrolyte balance available at the touch of a button, modern sports have long exceeded the 10,000 hour rule. Real-time data collection has been a big difference, leading to advanced performance analysis and the development of predictive models. It’s safe to say, modern sports is as much a function of the athletes’ physical and technical abilities as it is about adapting to the ever-changing technologies of the game.

The US swimming team at the Paris Olympics is accompanied by Professor Ken Ono. The 56-year-old mathematics professor at the University of Virginia uses math to create 3D models of athletes and comes up with suggestions that help US swimmers shave off precious milliseconds.

Ono, whose day job is studying problems in number theory, began working with swimmers at Emory University in Atlanta a decade ago, using accelerometers strapped to the athletes. Now he relies on the latest sensors and high-definition underwater cameras to measure the swimmer’s acceleration and the G-forces acting against them. Adjustments can be as simple as changing the depth of the dive, the way they expect to turn, or the way they hold their head in the water.

“The level of involvement of science in modern sports, whether it is training to make maps and improve performances has changed a lot in the last ten years. The use of Artificial Intelligence and Virtual Reality will become the next big change,” feels Tom Brownlee, associate professor in Applied Sport Sciences at the University of Birmingham.

“Let’s say you are a defender in a football game and you are beaten by a winger. The defender can put on those VR glasses and replay the situation to find the best way to deal with the situation. You can also use it for pattern recognition in sports that require repetition, such as jumping and throwing. It can be a great visualization tool,” Brownlee adds.

The Indian ecosystem, by and large, is still adapting to next-generation technology. If the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City opened up sports scientists to the possibilities of speeding up sprint times at high altitude and introduced the concept of high-performance training for distance runners, India embraced this concept in the last decade. ago. Boxer Amit Panghal thought his preparation was foolish after a month-long camp at Shilaroo, 8000 meters above sea level. The problem is, boxers are starting to rely on VR and Extended Reality (XD) to put themselves in their opponents’ shoes.

“In India, sports science is at a nascent stage. We are very behind,” says Ramji Srinivasan, former coach of the men’s cricket team. “Many of our sports organizations haven’t started recording the basic physiology of athletes. We tend to copy exercise plans and diets before thinking too much about our body type and genetics. We we need to improve our training,” he said.

“Information is key,” agrees Samuel Pullinger, head of sports science at IIS. “Since we don’t have physical history or nutritional data to measure an athlete’s condition, we always do strength testing and musculoskeletal testing based on their condition. In fact, the best technology is needs to be used properly in the context of talent identification.”

The Long Term Athlete Development Plan (LTAD) of sports organizations needs to integrate sports science, feels Srinivasan. “It has to be a systemic process. You can’t wake up one day and expect athletes to be comfortable with technology,” he says. A case in point is the opposition that exists among many wealthy elites. country, born last year, to the methods and methods of the current high-performance coach Pierre Beauchamp. Shooters did not like to share their data and many of them saw little value in ts’ in practice.

“Why do we need to share how many hours we slept? What does the color of my urine have to do with my shooting? the shooter told HT at the time. Many of them still bought this idea. One of them is coming home with two Olympic medals.