The experience of wise coaches and behaviour of World Class athletes supports the importance of controlling your environment to ensure peak performance. Around major games and important events, the need to minimize distractions is often a priority.

So what are the implications of this in daily sport or an active healthy lifestyle?  It can be as simple as when we schedule hard workouts, when we do skills work, the importance of managing distractions, minimizing stress before important events, etc.

The possibilities are endless…

ScienceDaily (Sep. 25, 2009) — Have you ever sat down to work on a crossword puzzle only to find that afterwards you haven’t the energy to exercise? Or have you come home from a rough day at the office with no energy to go for a run?

“Cognitive tasks, as well as emotional tasks such as regulating your emotions, can deplete your self-regulatory capacity to exercise,” says Kathleen Martin Ginis, associate professor of kinesiology at McMaster University, and lead author of the study.

Martin Ginis and her colleague Steven Bray used a Stroop test to deplete the self-regulatory capacity of volunteers in the study. (A Stroop test consists of words associated with colours but printed in a different colour. For example, “red” is printed in blue ink.) Subjects were asked to say the colour on the screen, trying to resist the temptation to blurt out the printed word instead of the colour itself.

“After we used this cognitive task to deplete participants’ self-regulatory capacity, they didn’t exercise as hard as participants who had not performed the task. The more people “dogged it” after the cognitive task, the more likely they were to skip their exercise sessions over the next 8 weeks. “You only have so much willpower.”

Still, she doesn’t see that as an excuse to let people loaf on the sofa.

“There are strategies to help people rejuvenate after their self-regulation is depleted,” she says. “Listening to music can help; and we also found that if you make specific plans to exercise—in other words, making a commitment to go for a walk at 7 p.m. every evening—then that had a high rate of success.”

She says that by constantly challenging yourself to resist a piece of chocolate cake, or to force yourself to study an extra half-hour each night, then you can actually increase your self-regulatory capacity.

“Willpower is like a muscle: it needs to be challenged to build itself,” she says.

The study was made possible through funding by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Stephanie Kieffer recently won the Women’s 40-44 category at the ITU Olympic Distance triathlon World Championships in Australia.  She added this to her recent 2nd place overall and win of the women’s 40-44 category at the 2009 Canadian National Championships.

Steph is having an incredible two years beginning with her first ever World Championship win at the 2008 ITU Worlds in Vancouver and a 3rd overall and women’s 40-44 win at Canadian Championships.  These results won her the Triathlon Canada athlete of the year for women 40+ AND a Triathlete Canada magazine triathlete of the year recognition.

Also worth of recognition are Amy Kirkham’s 4th place overall at National Championships and a 2nd in Women 25-29 and Martina Wan’s 10th place finish in the Elite Women’s race.

Way to go girls!

The first two article from our Dragon Boat Coaching Manual, on safety and the team are now posted!

Every individual athlete and team looking to win has a competition plan.

What makes a Great Plans different from a good plan? Why can some athletes exceed expectations in major events, while others are lucky to finish in one piece?  For one, many athletes are taught that a competition plan is a series of instructions on how to execute a top performance, from wake up time, meals, hydration, etc. through to the finish of the event.  While this is a core aspect of a plan, it is not what makes a Great Plans.

Great Plans know and accept the reality of each individual’s strengths and weaknesses.  These are the hard rules to your plan and can not be improved on once the competition is underway;

• Physiological parameters: pVO2, HR, lung capacity, anaerobic threshold, etc.
• Biomechanical parameters: muscular force, range of motion, muscular velocity, power output, bike fit, etc.
• Psychological parameters: behaviours, positive thinking, focusing, relaxing, coping, visualizing, etc.

And to a lesser degree, the things you can’t change but will impact your performance if you ignore them;

• Equipment: wetsuit, goggles, bike, hydration, nutrition, bike aerodynamics, tire pressure
• Race course: knowing where to go and how to get there on race day and before
• Rules and officiating: how you play the game

Once the competition is underway, these parameters set limits.  To the athlete in survival mode, the race outcome is almost exclusively a function of their strengths and weaknesses.

For the Champions with a Great Plan they can also see possibilities leading to whole other worlds unfolding and blossoming around them.  A world of endless opportunities.  Being in the right place at the right time has nothing to do with luck, but all about awareness of how to seize a good opportunity.  On the flip side, the right opportunities are only possible if you can be aware of and negate any threats to that will expose a weakness or limit your strengths.

So go ahead begin with time management and basic strategy using your known strength and weaknesses.  Then take the extra step and consider the opportunities out there.

This could be as simple as examining each opponent and figuring out how to capitalize on each of their weakness.  And while you’re looking at your opponents, remember to do the same on yourself!  This is how they will see you.  Some might even consider it flattering that an opponent has considered their weaknesses and how to exploit them!

A more complex analysis could involve breaking down strengths and weaknesses as a function of time (i.e. every 10-15 minutes in a marathon, minute by minute in a middle distance event, etc.), specific events (i.e. cornering on a bike criterium, left vs right corners, corners into uphills, etc.) or even as a function of weather (i.e. high heat, extreme cold, wind, rain, etc.)… the possibilities are endless, as are the opportunities.

A Great Plan should not be so complex you can’t use it.  Let it grow with time as you learn more about your opponents and about yourself.

Now go make your own Great Plan.

At some point, every coach has to step back and let athletes discover on their own.  This can be technique learning, race tactics or time management.

The lessons learned through discovery based learning are much more powerful than any directed or facilitated learning.  With every athlete there will be a different point that discovery based learning can be introduced.  Younger athletes who have not acquired any “bad habits” can benefit from discovery very quickly.  Older athletes and adults who have accumulated more numerous experience, both good and bad will need more of a guided approach to discovery based learning.

I have one such athlete who I feel is ready for more discovery based learning right now, both for race strategies and tactics as well as technical learning.

So, I’ve handed over the keys to the car and until its back in the garage in one piece I’ll be making some discoveries of my own!

Alan

NOTE: dragon boat and generic training notes will be going on line shortly.

ScienceDaily (Oct. 5, 2008) — Dogs are often called “man’s best friend,” and rightly so. Consider, for example, that they never interrupt us when we talk, are always happy to see us when we arrive home, and provide comfort when we are lovesick. Since dogs became domesticated 15,000 years ago, they have worked with and lived next to humans, which some say may account for the special bond.  Each of the 400 breeds and varieties are unique, but only one stands out as the ultra-athlete canine: the racing sled dogs.

Racing sled dogs are best known for their “mushing” each March during the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, the world’s longest sled race. They are the premier ultra-endurance competitors, covering 1,100 miles from Anchorage to Nome, Alaska, sometimes in just nine days. It is unclear how they can keep running, despite heavy blizzards, temperatures as low as –40°F, and winds up to 60 mph.  No other animal has been found to come close to the physiological attributes these dogs display.

Dr. Michael Davis has focused on the mysteries of this breed for work for more than a decade. The professor at the Oklahoma State University’s Center for Veterinary Health Sciences will discuss his recent findings entitled, “Metabolic Strategies for Sustained Endurance Exercise: Lessons from the Iditarod.” His presentation is part of the American Physiological Society’s (APS) conference, The Integrative Biology of Exercise V, being held September 24-27, 2008 in Hilton Head, SC.

Lead dogs heading out of Willow at the start of Iditarod 2007. It is unclear how these racing dogs can keep running, despite heavy blizzards, temperatures as low as –40°F, and winds up to 60 mph. No other animal has been found to come close to the physiological attributes these dogs display. (Credit: iStockphoto/Matt Cooper)

How Do They Do It? The Exercise Physiology of Sled Dogs

The physiological understandings that Davis and his colleagues have uncovered thus far are extensive. Among their findings is:

Rapid Adaptation to Exercise and Endurance—The most striking feature of these canines is their ability to rapidly adapt to sustained strenuous exercise in 24-48 hours. Conditioned dogs display most of the metabolic changes that are found in human endurance athletes during their first day of exercise, including depletion of muscle energy reserves, increases in stress hormones, evidence of cellular injury (such as to proteins, lipids and DNA), and oxidative stress. However, with subsequent consecutive days of exercise at the same intensity, these changes are reversed. Within four days after exercise begins, the metabolic profile of the dogs returns to where it was before the race began, despite their sustained, strenuous exercise. When human ultra-athletes become fatigued, they stay that way until a period of recovery that may take a full day.

Enormous Aerobic Capacity—Racing sled dogs have enormous aerobic capacity. While the untrained sled dogs have an average aerobic capacity of 175 ml/kg/min VO2 max (ratio of volume of oxygen to body weight per minute), the aerobic capacity of the fully conditioned sled dogs is estimated to be about twice that (300 ml/kg/min).

[Alan: NOTE elite human cross country skiers are in the 80-90 ml/kg/min aerobic power range- less than 30% of the top sled dogs in peak form!]

Using A High-Fat Diet to Fuel Exercise—During periods of racing, sled dogs can burn up to 12,000 kilocalories per day (kcal/day). This means that a 55-pound sled dog will consume the equivalent of 24 McDonald’s Big Macs to fuel their run on any given day. Some of the running dog’s high-fat diet is converted to energy in the liver, and used as fuel in the initial stages of exercise. Preliminary data suggests that this process is a desirable trait intended to efficiently support exercise in the racers. It is worth noting that humans would need 72 Big Macs to fuel the power they need to make a day’s run, assuming their body could absorb and process all the fat contained in the beef.

Next Steps

The mechanisms that make these four-legged athletes premiere in performance is still unknown. Dr. Davis theorizes that it may involve the regulation of extremely thin membranes in the muscle fibers and changes in the cells that are responsible for the body’s energy production. “These are one-of-a-kind athletes. What we learn from them will undoubtedly tell us a lot about human performance as well.”

Here is a summary of my notes from Dr. Charles Cardinal’s presentation at the 2008 Sport Science and Technology summit

Pre-planning rationale
Integrity in the plan
Program approach and individual approach

Program model

• Observation
• Sport analysis
• Team / individual assessment
• Concept utilization
• Skills / strategies
• Implementation | simulation
• Evaluation in competition and training
• Observation

YTP integration
Preplan with HPD and coach(es)
Mindeval > instant feedback
Biofeedback stress report

Log

• Daily goals
• Weekly goals
• Weekly technical evaluation
• Professional attitude test
• Weekly training chart

Tracking and monitoring

• IST- google docs
• YTP | Excel | Adobe
• Feedback athletes / coaches/ IST
• End of year reports

No more thinking at start or (or T-5 min)

Debrief

• Skills (psychology)
• Technical (sport skills)
• Plan | tactics | strategy
• Warm up and warm down

Coach feedback

• YTP
• Assess results
• Team climate
• Intervention
• Coaching behaviour
• Leadership style
• Video coach at work | training | competition | social

Program evaluation

• Athlete
• HPD
• Coaches
• IST

Major Games Years

• Team only
• Nothing new refine and consolidate

Coach athlete session with sport psychologist

• Athlete must do session to overcome issues or they are off the team
• Sport psychology for coaches

Coach confidence

• No hesitations ever or athletes lose confidence

GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS

• See about ordering special meals (high protein/lower carb for the first meal and higher carbs/vegetarian before landing)
• For important events or long 8+ hour flights, an upgrade to business class would be very beneficial to keep you comfortable and better rested.
• Try to book direct flights to your destination. Saving on the flight and compromising your perfomrance is a waste of money, time and effort
• Carry bike shoes, pedals, helmet, race clothing, swim goggles, running shoes and other irreplaceable items in your carry on bag(s)
• Ship your bike back cargo after the event if traveling more.
• Ensure you have all medical needs covered;
  • copies of all prescriptions for customs, local MD’s, reordering, etc.- be aware that some medications may be illegal in the places you visit even if legal at home!)
  • extra prescription medication
  • extra eyeglasses and contacts- prescription as well
  • travel and sport accident insurance

JET LAG

• Allow 1 day adaptation per hour of jet lag
• Allow 1 day adaptation per 5 C temp/humidex difference

• Options to minimize
  • begin adapting sleep-wake-meal cycle a couple of weeks earlier up to 4 hours advance / delay only at 1 hour every 3-4 days
  • training: adjusts intensity to match race time and race time zone ASAP
  • reset circadian rhythm quickly through meals and sunlight. Adjust to your anticipated race day sleep pattern from when you arrive.

HYDRATION

• Request lots of water be ready for you at your seat
• plan on 1 litre/hour even on short flights
• do not depend on in flight service which can take 60-90 minutes from when you board the plane
• consider a nebulizer specific for travel (i.e. something like this) to hydrate the air you breath on the plane (airplane air is very, very dry and dried out mucous membranes can increase the risk of infection)

• If you can bring some of water of your own and carry a big empty bottle for the flight crew to fill for you later when things settle down

INTERNATIONAL

• Make sure your passport is still valid until 6 months after your trip.

Major events (Nationals, Worlds, World Cups)

• Allow maximum time for adaptation at venue, no cutting corners!
• Even driving time need 1 day recovery / 2 hours driving for peak performance
• We go together to make sure we get the best out of you!

Here are my notres from a presentation by Kelly Anne Erdmann from the Canadian Sport Centre Calgary on her research into the nutritional habits of Canadian Olympians

Take home messages

• Sources of dietary information for athletes

1. Family and friends
2. Strength trainers
3. Team mates
4. Coaches

…14.  Dietitians!!!

• Men and women 300 kcal below optimal level based on energy expenditure estimates
• For women <300 kcal below optimal results in elevated risk of amenorrhea

Dietary considerations: macronutrients

CHO 50-55%

• Low % re optimal is due to higher overall caloric intake
• 6 g/kg body weight is ideal
• Endurance athletes needs more than 6 g/kg; at 20+ hrs of training 10 g/kg

PRO 15-35%

• 1.2-1.4 g/kg
• Adequate protein intake

FAT 20-25%

• 1 g/kg
• Adequate fat intake

Quantity of caloric intake is sufficient for many athletes
Timing of intake needs more careful monitoring to optimize refueling and recovery strategies

Dietary considerations: Micronutrients

Low levels: B9 and Ca

• Folate (B9) for immune system
• Calcium for women

Above “tolerable” levels: B3, D, Mg, Zn

• B3 (Niacin) = facial flushing
• D no known side effects
• Magnesium diarrhea
• Zinc part or iron-copper-zinc negative feed-forward cycle

High performance considerations

Awareness of CHO deficiency signs

• Poor recovery
• Heavy muscles
• Lower lactate production and loss of power at peak aerobic power and higher
• Loss of lean body mass
• Increase of fat mass (CHO needed to burn fat)

A few weeks ago I attended the Sport Innovation (SPIN) conference and was lucky enough to hear Dr Charles Samuels present on the latest research in sleep and human performance. Dr. Samuels works at the Centre for sleep and human performance in Calgary Alberta.  As it turns out Canada is a world leader in understanding the effects of sleep on human performance.

Here is a summary of the note I took at the presentation;

Delay in the natural sleep phase causes athletes (especially teenagers) to stay up too late: too much stimulation late in evening/night and not enough light in the morning

Most important element in good sleep habits is a routine;

• same bed time and waking time every day of the week
• cultivate ideal sleep environment
• high performance athletes need approximately 9 hrs of sleep on average. Minor deficits can be made up within 24-48 hrs

REM cycles dictate sleep – wake cycles

• Cycles are 2 hours ± 30 min
• Natural sleep duration multiples of REM cycle
• Forcing waking in mid-REM leads to poor performance

Target exercise at optimal times re sleep habits

Adjust training schedule from 7 am workout to 9:30-10 am pushes sleep cycle back

No training within 3-4 hours of bed time keeps cycle from moving forward

Chronotype: Mid-range is most common

• Bedtime 11-12 pm
• Wake time 8-9 am
• Nap time 2-3 pm (max 30 min)
• Total sleep time: 9 hrs

Basic science of sleep: sleep is driven by fatigue debt that begins accumulating on waking

Three factors affecting sleep

• homeostatic function: sleep quantity = sleep debt
• circadian: sleep quality = minimal disruptions (internal or external)
• ultradian: circadian timing = light exposure (10 000 LUX)
  • Key hormone: adenosine accumulates with increased sleep debt

Circadian physiology

Genotype dictates diurnal preference

Core temperature: lower core temp encourages better sleep early and late in sleep cycle. Core temperature lowest in deep REM sleep- Japanese layered quilts (early sleep thinner layers- deep sleep thicker layers, more thermal layering over core than extremities)

Melatonin secretion: related to light exposure, peak melatonin levels occur with lowest core temperatures

Phase adjustment: related to light exposure, modified by light therapy. Melatonin therapy is very risky and best left to sleep experts (not GP or sport MDs)

• Light therapy: 30 min @ 10 000 LUX within 60 min of waking can push sleep cycle back

Amount of sleep

Determine true sleep needs: cover all clocks, no noise, no light, comfortable and go to sleep when tired and wake when ready. Repeat for 2-7 days to establish baseline

Factors affecting timing of sleep

• Endogenous (physiology, fatigue, etc.)
• Exogenous (noise, light, ambient temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, etc.)
• Jet lag

Quality of sleep

• Environmental factors (allergies, pollutants, chemical)
• Sleep disorders
• Actigraph: a  small sensitive 3D accelerometer worn to monitor sleep-wake cycle patterns

Jet lag

Begin adjusting 2 weeks earlier and allow four days after for smoothest transition

Sleep periodization planning

• Sleep screening
• Daily sleep log
• Design a sleep program
• Light therapy
• Jet lag management
  • Awareness of sleep cycle
• Learn what each athlete needs for sleep
• Manage sleep debt on micro scale first, macro scale second
• Minimize disruption of sleep-wake cycle
• poor sleep requires help
• rest and sleep important for active recovery
  • Sleep adequate? Don’t changing anything?

Sleep management

• Limit exposure to TV and LCD screens in 2 hrs prior to sleep time
• Includes video games
• Computer screens
• Anything mentally stimulating
• Wind down before sleep time- quiet, relax

Insomnia/hypersomnia

• Missing REM
• Interrupted REM
• Forced arousal (waking) = reduced test
• Manipulate rhythm 30-40% resistance
• Eating re sleep recovery
  • 4 hrs prior to sleep onset
  • Digestion affects sleep to same degree as performance

Injury

• Post concussion
• Insomnia an issue
• Hypersomnia not an issue

RESOURCE TO READ

• Sleep, recovery and performance: the new frontier in high performance athletics (C. Samuels, 2006)