GPS Not Just For Your Car Anymore!

Technology is advancing at a rapid pace these days and there are applications available for almost everything. Global Positioning Systems (GPS) are now considered standard equipment in cars and vehicles to help you get where you are going.

Recently, SIRC has discovered that more and more journals in the SIRC Collection are including articles on ways to use a GPS to help you in your sport and fitness training. From running, skiing, cycling, and walking to rowing, soccer and tennis, a GPS can provide a multitude of information to coaches and athletes to improve their training.

A GPS can help you:

• track speed and distance
• track an athlete in team sport
• simulate a race course
• even monitor heart rate when connected to other applications

These are only a few of the ways a GPS and technology in general can help you in your training. There are more innovative ways to use technology to push the envelope and achieve your next personal best.

Check out the following resources to help jump start your GPS training :

• GPS Applications in Sport
• Athletic Sports and GPS
• Get Back in Shape With GPS for Fitness and Training

Be sure to visit SIRC for even more great resources on GPS and training.

Sit-up Straight!

Ever find yourself hunched over your computer at work with back pain or rubbing the back of your shoulders or neck to get rid of the knot in your muscle? Many of us suffer from the pains of poor posture at the computer workstation. Those that use computers for more than 5 hours a day can be more than twice as likely to have back problems as those that don’t. These problems could be prevented by an ergonomically correct set-up at your station which aids in proper alignment. If you are looking to improve your posture or to give your tired muscles a break, try some work-based posture exercises for relief.

A great article in the SIRC Collection that will help you set up your workstation and gives you some posture exercises is:

• Desk Posture. SportEx Medicine. Issue 41 (July 2009), p.17-19.

And for those of you who are looking to create a happier and healthier work environment, remember that research from the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) has shown that workers are more productive and work better with others after an exercise break. So get up off those chairs and start moving!

At SIRC You Learn Something New Every Day!

The SIRC Collection receives new publications everyday and it is always exciting to see what new research and fun facts are being published. It is very common to hear one of the SIRC Staff start a sentence with “Did you know…” As we come to the end of 2009 here are a few items that have completed the “Did you know…” sentence.

• About 25% of athletic trainers use pickle juice to treat muscle cramps. Some report, that 1 to 2oz (30-6- mL) of pickle juice relieves cramps within 35 seconds. The mechanism is illusive because rapid relief must mean that pickle juice empties from the stomach very quickly, yet a gastric-emptying study with pickle juice indicates it empties very slowly from the stomach.


• Simply rinsing the mouth with sports drink helps runners run faster. After an overnight fast (13-15h without food) and before and during a 1-hour run, 10 trained runners rinsed their mouth for 5 seconds with a sports drink, and then spit it out. With the sports drink mouth rinse; they were able to run 365 meters longer during the hour.


• A study of 634 nutrition supplements indicated that about 15% contained a banned substance, even though the supplement came from a factory that did not manufacture the banned substances (i.e. steroids, ephedrine). The products most likely to be contaminated with illegal compounds include bodybuilding supplements and weight loss products.

If you liked these did you knows make sure that you check out the SIRC Newsletters! Not only do they have a Did you know … section but they contain many interesting articles from the SIRC Collection.

Baby It’s Cold Outside…

We will see 150 competitive events in the upcoming Winter Games in February but that doesn’t cover all of the activities that are available in the winter months! Winter weather has arrived in Canada and across the country temperatures can range from +9°C to -45°C. For most of the country this means it is cold outside – freezing cold – and you have two choices stay inside or go outside and play! If you are prepared for the weather, Canada can be a winter wonderland with never-ending possibilities of things to do.

Thinking it’s too cold outside? There are so many things that can keep you toasty while enjoying the outdoors. Developments over the years have led to thermal fabrics using body moisture to generate heat to boots and gloves with heating mechanisms to keep your digits nice and warm. Try not to get too overwhelmed by all the options and don’t forget there are review guides that can help you.

You may have been skating, skiing, snowshoeing, sledding, running, snowboarding, or dog-sledding but there are other possibilities. Why not try heli-skiing, snow kiting, and ice climbing. As we ring in the New Year and recover from the holiday season why not give these new winter activity a go in 2010? Information about all of these activities and many more can be found within the SIRC library.

Keep reading because there will be much more featured on winter fun in the upcoming months!

What’s on your playlist?

Now that you’ve made that resolution to have a fitter 2010, it’s time to lace up your trainers and get moving. A great way to get into the exercise groove is to listen to music, which will help to motivate you through our workout. Music can help you ignore the aches and pains or fatigue and also help regulate your pace. Science now tells us that songs with the right characteristics can increase our exercise performance by up to 20%. (Journal of Sport & Exercise Psychology 31(1), p. 18-36 Author: Karageorghis, Costas I. et al, available through SIRC)

The article entitled “Ergogenic Tunes” (Canadian Running 2(5) July/Aug 2009, p. 30) provides a helpful chart of song selections from Rock, Pop, Soul/R&B and Classical music to help you reach a variety of exercise intensities. It’s important to find music that not only addresses your personal taste but provides lyrics and beats that match the intensity and length of your workout. Need help deciding what the right tempo is? Check out this chart which explain factors that go into selecting the appropriate beats per minute (BPM) for a variety of activities (walking, jogging, running, cycling, stairclimbers, ellipticals, and yoga/pilates).

Another way to freshen up your music is to ask your friends, colleagues and other fitness enthusiasts for their favorites. So plug in and let’s get on the move.

Here are a few of the many websites out there that provide training and exercise oriented music:
Run2Rhythm (http://www.run2r.com/)
PODRUNNER (http://www.djsteveboy.com/podrunner.html)
Motion Traxx (http://motiontraxx.com/)

New mail is always exciting!

New material is always arriving for the SIRC Collection. Today one of the latest issues of British Journal of Sports Medicine (BJSM) arrived in the mail. As soon as it arrived the SIRC Librarians took a quick scan through and it looks good. In fact, it is sure to be a popular issue in the SIRC Collection over the upcoming months. This issue is the Vancouver Olympics issue covering sports such as alpine skiing, snowboarding, ice hockey and ski jumping as well as many other interesting research articles.

Here are a few highlights:

• The adoption of new rules for ski jumping based on research outlined in the article “Towards research-based approaches for solving body composition problems in sports: ski jumping as a heuristic example.”
• It takes 30-45 minutes for a swimmer (and several helpers) to dress in an expensive polyurethane swimsuit that malfunction and tears easily.
• The knee (68%) is the most injured body part in Alpine skiers followed by lower back/pelvis/sacrum (22%), lower leg/Achilles tendon (22%), hand/finger/thumb (17%) and head/face (16%).
• Full Facial Protection in ice hockey provides the best protection against overall head injuries.
• Several risk factors can combine to increase injury in Alpine skiing: low speed, high readiness for risk, new skiing equipment, old and powdered snow, and drug consumption.

If you are looking for additional information on injury prevention and sport medicine you can find it in the Online Resources Injury section which highlights past newsletters and full-text articles.

Let’s talk about cricket!

As a Canadian that’s not a statement you hear too often, but the sport of Cricket is growing in popularity in this country by leaps and bounds. For example in the Toronto area alone the Toronto and District Cricket Association is the largest amateur club in North American and has over 1300 players on 92 teams. One of those players, Rizwan Cheema, a recent immigrant from Pakistan, who only played at the club level in his home country, not only plays for the National Team here in Canada, but is also getting international recognition. He is currently one of 51 players through to the final phase of the Indian Premier League auction. (This is like the NHL draft of cricket). Mr. Cheema owes this honour, not only to his skills but to the support and training he has received in Canada.

As Cricket Canada president Ranjit Saini stated in a January 6th , 2010 press release “This is a proud moment for Cricket Canada and its members" he later went on to add “Should Rizwan get selected and becomes part of IPL, the boost in Cricket Canada brand name will be phenomenal and the public awareness about Cricket in North America and particularly Canada will grow significantly. "

Interesting Cricket Canada Information:
The Canadian Cricket Association (now called Cricket Canada) was established in 1892.

The first recorded game of Cricket played in Canada was in 1785 at Ile-Ste-Helene in Montreal, Quebec.

In 2009, over 20,000 children throughout Canada played cricket in both school and community based development programs.

Cricket Canada’s head office is located in the SAO building along with SIRC’s new regional office in Toronto. The staff memebrs of Cricket Canada are avid users of the SIRC collection and borrow materials on a regular basis. SIRC is happy to help Cricket Canada with their research needs.

SIRC Newsletter -The Top 10 Most Requested Topics of 2009

Check out the latest SIRC Newsletter -The Top 10 Most Requested Topics of 2009!

SIRC is your national sport library and in 2009 you proved that learning and staying informed are important. You came from over 800 different cities and towns in Canada (view map) to find information on injury prevention, coaching techniques, motivation and much more. Last year we added over 30,000 new sport related articles to the library (which were reviewed and indexed by our information specialists) and we noticed some intriguing trends. The most requested and sought after topics were:




http://sirc.ca/newsletters/january10/index.html

Drink up!

We all know how important it is to remain hydrated during sport and exercise so as to maintain our performance level. Your body needs to replace fluids, sodium, potassium, chloride and other elements lost during exertion. And while it is important to consume liquids there may be a couple of little known facts that you might be interested to add to your knowledge bank.

• Did you know that emerging data shows that simply washing the mouth with water or sports drink can effectively delay fatigue? So while consuming the necessary fluids is important, rinsing your mouth can be beneficial as well. (article 3)


• The same article suggests that people who drank fluids from freely flowing sources such as a cup or open mouth bottle consume more than those who drink from a straw? Something to think about next time you use that squeeze bottle, perhaps taking the nozzle out might be more beneficial. (article 3)


• You may not feel like your sweating as much during cold weather workouts, but you are still losing fluids while exercising in the winter. You may not need the same amount of electrolyte replacement as during the summer, but it is important to keep up fluid levels as cold-weather dehydration can increase the risk of hypothermia. (article 4)

So whether you are a recreational or high performance athlete, and it’s summer or winter it is important to check and maintain a good fluid balance to stay at your best performance level. Checkout these and other hydration-related resources at the SIRC library:

1. Hydration science-From Hype to Hyponatremia Scan’s Pulse, Summer 2009, 28(3) p.17
   
2. Gregory Seale. Water and the Energy Drink. SPED: Sport and Physical Education. May 2009, 6(1) p.8-9.
   
3. Kirkendall, Donald. Hydration: It’s Just the First Step. Soccer Journal, September-October 2009, 54(5) p. 20.
   
4. Carmichael, Chris. Drinking Problem. Outside. December 2006, 31(12) p. 80.

Rugby Injury Crisis?!?

"I prefer rugby to soccer. I enjoy the violence in rugby, except when they start biting each other's ears off." - Elizabeth Taylor (1972)

It is said that the birthplace of rugby was 1823 when William Webb Ellis "with fine disregard for the rules of football (remember football was yet to split into the various codes) as played in his time at Rugby school, first took the ball in his arms and ran with it, thus originating the distinctive feature of the Rugby game". In Canada, Rugby dates back to the 1860s with the arrival of immigrants, regimental armies and the Royal Navy.

Rugby is a demanding, full contact team sport. In the latest issue of Rugby World a 16-page investigation looks at whether there is an injury crisis in the game. Some interesting statistics include:

• 72% of injuries occur as a result of contact with another player (a tackle, a ruck and son on) according to RFU figures. Of those, 51% occur in the tackle.


• The average number of injuries each Guinness Premiership club will suffer each season, is 92 including 22 in training, according to the England Rugby Injury and Training Audit conducted between 2002 and 2004.


• Are players too big? The average British & Irish Lions player was 8 pounds heavier in 2009 compared to 2005.


• The London Irish rugby team expects 15-20% of their players to be injured at any time.


• The average amount of impact a player takes in a match is like being hit by a Mack truck at 75mph compared to the nineties when the impact felt like a Mini at 50mph.

Rugby is just one of many sports that face injury issues. One of the most popular topics at SIRC is injury prevention and treatment. There is a constant flow of information in this area. So far this month over 80 articles relating to injury in sport have become searchable in the SIRC Collection including:

Fuller, C., Caswell, S., & Zimbwa, T. (2010). Do mismatches between teams affect the risk of injury in the Rugby World Cup?. Journal of Science & Medicine in Sport, 13(1), 36-38.

Gianotti, S., Hume, P., & Tunstall, H. (2010). Efficacy of injury prevention related coach education within netball and soccer. Journal of Science & Medicine in Sport, 13(1), 32-35.

Lederman, E. (2010). The myth of core stability. Journal of Bodywork & Movement Therapies, 14(1), 84-98.

Stricker, G., Scheiber, P., Lindenhofer, E., & Mueller, E. (2010). Determination of forces in alpine skiing and snowboarding: Validation of a mobile data acquisition system. European Journal of Sport Science, 10(1), 31-41.

Did you know:
Heather Moyse is a dual national athlete in bobsleigh and rugby. Moyse and Humphries will compete in the 8th race of the World Cup season January 22nd in Igis, Austria. Watch for them both in the upcoming Winter Games in Vancouver!

Getting kids active!

So we’ve made the commitment to get ourselves healthy and active in the new year … but what about our kids? The good news is that the number of Canadian children who are active is on the rise; however there is much work still to be done.

ParticipACTION has compiled the latest facts and stats on the state of physical activity and inactivity for children in Canada. With physical activity pegged as a potential solution to the increase in health care spending to treat chronic diseases associated with obesity, we know that helping kids get more active is:

• Better for their physical health
• Better for their academic achievement (Article 1)
• Better for their emotional well-being

There are many resources available to help you in the quest to get your kids more active and SIRC is happy to have compiled a few to get you stared:

• Kids in Motion Stay in Motion. Includes examples of innovative exercise and weight management programs for children. (Article 2)
• Outdoor Winter Activities. Listings of a variety of activities that you can do with your kids to up the activity level. Also included are lists of other activities that can be done in warmer weather and with different populations.
• Winter Olympic Activities for Kids. Athletics, Games and Cold Weather Sports for Children. Adapt your favorite activities to make your own Olympic Games.
• Backyard Olympics. To beat the February blahs and get moving try a few of these events for your own homegrown Olympics.
• PlaySport. An educational website developed by PHE Canada and Ophea that has all kinds of great activities designed to teach kids games by playing games

Articles available through SIRC:

1. Gray, Sarah. 0verweight Students: Can Education Help Curb This Mounting Problem? Physical and Health Education. Summer 2009, 75(2) p.6-11.
2. Williams, Alexandra. Kids in Motion Stay in Motion. IDEA Fitness Journal. Feb 2008 5(2) p. 38-45.

Are Wii active?

A lot of us have taken advantage of the revolution in gaming technology and gotten hooked in to the latest interactive video games. These game consoles are a hit with young and old alike, with everything from tennis to dancing, we can all find an interactive sport application to enjoy.

Did you know:

• A study presented at the American College of Sports Medicine’s Annual Meeting 2009 showed that Nintendo Wii’s Bowling significantly increased heart rate, boosted mood and helped older-adult participants feel refreshed and energized.
• Another study showed that time spent playing motion and gesture controlled video games can count towards the daily amount of exercise required to maintain cardiovascular fitness according to guidelines provided by the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM), provided they are played in an active fashion.
• Research also shows that children can benefit from the new home gaming technology as well. Studies suggest that engaging in these physically active games requires more than twice the energy of traditional video games and raises children’s activity levels enough to meet guidelines for moderate-intensity activity.

The SIRC collection contains a variety of studies examining how physically interactive games can help get people of all ages get up and moving. Check some out today!

Toronto Info Session a Great Success!

On January 28th the Toronto Regional Office of SIRC held an information session for SIRC members who were interested in learning how to better work with the SIRC Collection and SIRC Services to help them and their organization. We had a full house with representatives from a variety of organizations including the Ontario Badminton Association, Ontario Basketball Association, ParaSport Ontario, Cricket Canada, the Ontario Association of Triathletes, ROWONTARIO , the Sport Alliance of Ontario and the Ontario Ringette Association.
Attendees learned how to post jobs on the SIRC Career Page , advertise conferences and events on the Conference Calendar and submit a press release to the Press Release service.
Following this Amanda Street-Bishop and Brandie Adams, SIRC’s Information Specialists, led the group through the members’ area including a tutorial on the SportDiscus™ Database. The group was interested in finding articles on topics ranging from Sponsorship to Injury Prevention.

Armed with the knowledge of how to search the SIRC Collection, the session then moved on to the hands on portion. Attendees completed a scavenger hunt through the various SIRC Resources. Congratulations to Stephanie Wade of Triathlon Canada, Rebecca Norton of Coaches of Canada, Lizze McArdle of Sport4Ontario and Matt Kennedy of the Ontario Blind Sports Association who won our scavenger hunt competition.

Thanks to everyone that attended including some new members to SIRC: Christopher Lowcock of the Ontario Disc Sports Association and Chloe Greenhalgh of Dragon Boat Canada.

Feel Great this Winter!

Check out the lastest SIRC Newsletter -Feel Great this Winter!

Now that the holiday season has come to a close we look ahead to the enjoyment of winter time activities over the next few months. We all know the physical benefits of exercise but did you know that exercise and physical activity have been proven to have a positive impact on mental and emotional health? Although any type of physical activity is good, aerobic exercise is generally the most recommended. So the next time you need an energy boost, why not lace up your shoes and get moving!

http://sirc.ca/newsletters/mid-jan10/index.html

Heavy Lifters!!

Weightlifting, not a sport you usually think about doing in your retirement. Golf, bowling, curling – these are the more common pursuits of the retired generation. But these sports are not for everyone, especially if you are a Canadian Masters Weightlifting record holder and gold medalist. Bernie Eckler, a regular visitor to SIRC’s Toronto Regional library, is just that. Even though he is fast approaching 70 years old, Bernie still works out regularly with the Apollo Barbell Club, and works part-time for Athletics Ontario. Currently, he is planning a trip to the Pan American Masters Weightlifting Championships this June in Montreal.

The Apollo Barbell Club has quite a reputation in the Canadian Weightlifting world. In 2008 all 9 members of the club who competed in the Canadian Masters Championships won gold medals and in 2009 they won eight gold and one silver.

Weightlifting has been an Olympic Sport since 1920, and was first debuted in the 1896 Athens Summer Olympics. There are two areas of competition, the snatch and the clean and jerk. In the snatch, the bar is pulled in one explosive motion from the floor to full arm's length overhead. In the clean and jerk (C&J), the bar is also lifted to full arm's length overhead. However, although it is considered one event, the C&J is really two lifts that must be completed one immediately after the other. In the clean, the bar is raised (pulled) in an explosive motion from the floor to a point of rest approximately at the level of the shoulders. The second part of the C&J, the jerk, consists of bending the legs and then extending both the arms and the legs to bring the bar to full arm's length over the head in one explosive motion.

Here are just a few of the articles found in the SportDiscus™ Database on Masters Weightlifting…

• Age dependence of Olympic weightlifting ability. / Evolution avec l ' age de l ' aptitude pour l ' halterophilie. Meltzer, D.E., Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise Aug 1994: Vol. 26 Issue 8. p. 1053-1067
• Age, body mass, and gender as predictors of Masters Olympic weightlifting performance. The, D.J.; Ploutz-Snyder, L., Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise July 2003: Vol. 35 Issue 7. p. 1216-1224
• Injuries in Masters Weightlifters: A 4-Year Study at the World Masters Weightlifting Championships. (Poster Session) Lavallee, Mark E.; Kary, Joel M., Clinical Journal of Sport Medicine Sept 2007: Vol. 17 Issue 5. p. 426
• Muscle function in elite master weightlifters. Fonction musculaire chez des halterophiles de haut niveau. Pearson, S.J.; Young, A.; Macaluso, A.; Devito, G.; Nimmo, M.A.; Cobbold, M.; Harridge, S.D.R., Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise July 2002: Vol. 34 Issue 7. p. 1199-1206

Durham College Students learn the value of research!

Amanda Street-Bishop (Toronto’s Regional Information Specialist) received an invitation from Durham College’s Professor Kate Houze, to speak to their first year students enrolled in the Sport Administration and Sport Management programs. Students partook in a hands-on workshop which allowed them to learn about SIRC and how they can use us to help them in their second semester Sport Research Course. The purpose of this course is to present each student with a knowledge base and the relevant skills in order to better understand and function in the evolving sport management industry. The students study research and its application to the sport industry. Students examine research in detail – what it is, its purpose, its importance to industry, how to use, when to use it and then apply this knowledge to several research projects. Many sport management positions require one to research, to articulate an idea or concept and to present this information effectively to a board of directors, a client, a sponsor or other management groups making research an essential part of the Sport business environment.

The session was conducted in the school’s state of the art computer lab allowing each student to independently explore the SIRC site and the SportDiscus™ Database. The students were interested in scholarly, peer reviewed articles on a variety of topics including: steroid use in professional baseball, violence in amateur hockey and the promotion of mixed martial arts.

Here’s some of what they found:

• Financial Incentives and League Policy: The Example of Major League Baseball's Steroid Policy. Tainsky, Scott; Winfree, Jason A., European Sport Management Quarterly Mar2008, Vol. 8 Issue 1, p67
• Honor, ritual and violence in ice hockey. Colburn Jr., K., Canadian Journal of Sociology 1985: Vol. 10 Issue 2. p. 153-170
• Injury trends in sanctioned mixed martial arts competition: a 5-year from 2002 to 2007. Available Ngai, K. M.; Levy, F.; Hsu, E. B., British Journal of Sports Medicine Aug2008, Vol. 42 Issue 8, p686
• Mixed Martial Arts: The Book of Knowledge. Bolelli, Daniele, Journal of Asian Martial Arts 2007, Vol. 16 Issue 4, p86
• Public Perceptions of Steroid Use in Sport: Contextualizing Communication Efforts. Becker, Amy B.; Scheufele, Dietram A., International Journal of Sport Communication Dec2008, Vol. 1 Issue 4, p444
• The Relationship Between Spectator Motivations and Media and Merchandise Consumption at a Professional Mixed Martial Arts Event. Sport Marketing Quarterly 2009, Vol. 18 Issue 4, p199
• Sports MDs seek CMA support in bid to make hockey safer. Sullivan, P., Canadian Medical Association Journal Jan 15, 1990: Vol. 142 Issue 2. p. 157-159

Vancouver 2010 Olympics Off to a Great Start!

With the Winter Olympic Games well underway in Vancouver many of us are learning more about sports that we aren’t as familiar with, and learning new facts about our old favourites. Everyone now knows the answer to the question of who was the first Canadian to win gold at a home Games, Alex Bilodeau scored big to win gold in the men’s moguls competition. So how’s your knowledge of the other medaling sports?

Did you know:

• Since results in long track speed skating are given at one one hundredth of a second, radio transponders are used to accurately record time. Antennas are laid in the ice. Each athlete then has a transponder attached to the lace of their boot. Each transponder has a unique ID, so when the athlete goes over the antenna, the transponder is read and the ID is transferred to the results system. Five cameras are also employed to supply photos at the finish line.
• Snowboard cross has been described as the Olympics' version of NASCAR, 80 seconds of pushing, shoving and hurtling down a hill at breakneck speeds. Winning comes through equal parts skill and daring with a dash of luck thrown in.
• If you plan to hit the moguls course, Jen Heil says that having a strong core is the key to being able to react really quickly to the moguls and to allow the body to act as a shock absorber.

SIRC congratulates Canadian medal winners of the past weekend and all Canadian athletes with their Olympic efforts. If you’d like to find out more about the sports profiled at the Olympic Games check out the SIRC resources.

The Science of Superstitions

Have you ever noticed that your teammate beside you always puts their left skate on before their right and always wears different colour stockings? Have you ever wondered why your teammate ties each of their cleats three times or must shoot at the net exactly 7 times during warm up? The answer to the whys of these questions is a matter of superstition. You’ll notice that most everyone has routines that they go through before competition and whether these are comfort behaviours, rituals or superstitions, it all stems from personal research you have been conducting your whole life. Each one of us has unconsciously performed studies of cause and effect that have been stored in our brains for reference as to what “works” and what doesn’t when it comes to success on the athletic field. Our brains have millions of these cause and effect relationships that we use on a daily basis to guide our behaviour. Our brains work through all these scenarios in order to predict what the next best course of action is. However, sometimes we get what we may consider a short-wire and the brain connects two things that may have no actual relationship to each other … and come up with what many term a superstition. Does wearing the same shirt at each race really make us play better? Does being the last player out of the dressing room really mean we’ll win? It can’t be proven, but if it gives us confidence to perform better that’s an advantage. Just don’t get so caught up in rituals and superstitions that they create nerves and pressure, put the emphasis on using them in a positive way to improve your performance.

For more information on the relationship between rituals, superstitions and your brain contact SIRC.

Reference:Silverstor, Trevor (2009) Superstition. Ultra-FIT 19(7), October 2009, p.30-32.

What are coaches reading?

According to a recent issue of Olympic Coach, a lot! And you would be surprised at some of the titles. Oh there are the usual suspects – Periodization: Theory and Methodology of Training, Athletic Development: The Art and Science of Functional Sports Training , and Running – Biomechanics and Exercise Physiology Applied in Practice

But then there are some unusual titles. Books such as Mindset by Carol Dweck, with chapters on everything from “self-insight” to “what is success”; The Tao of Leadership: Lau Tzu’s Tao Te Ching Adapted for a New Age which teaches its readers how to be the very best kind of leader: be faithful, trust the process, pay attention, and inspire others to become their own leaders; and, Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software a book about the mystery of why the whole is sometimes smarter than the sum of its parts. Team dynamics and leadership qualities in a coach are areas where this book may prove helpful.

So what are you reading? Here are a few of the popular titles at the SIRC Toronto Regional Library:

• Speed for Sports Performance
• Exercise Technique Manual for Resistance Training
• What it takes to be #1: Vince Lombardi on Leadership
• The Sponsorship Seeker’s Toolkit

Reference:
Five for the Road, Olympic Coach. Spring 2009. 21(2). P. 6-7.

Coaches Association of Ontario – The Time is Now

This past weekend SIRC attended the 4th Annual Coaches Association of Ontario Coaches Conference – The Time Is Now. The conference was attended by almost 300 delegates from across Ontario and was held at the University of Guelph. SIRC participated in the trade show portion of the conference and Amanda Street-Bishop, Information Specialist at the SIRC Regional office in Toronto, presented a Professional Development Workshop on Competitive Intelligence for Sport Coaches.

The Workshop covered:

• Where to find the best coaching resources
• How to optimize your searching techniques, and,
• The easiest way to access Canada’s National Sport Library

The presentation was very well received with some participants following along on their own laptops. The session was interactive and included some great questions from the audience for the SportDiscus™ database on Lawn Bowling, Volleyball drills and how to motivate a team before a game.

Other sessions at the conference included:

• Understanding Your Coaching Style
• Developing Athleticism – The Foundation of Long-Term Sport Success
• Hot Topics in Sport Psychology
• Increasing Leadership Roles For Women

Click here for a link to these sessions and others from the conference.