I squinted at the PowerPoint and read the phrase ‘whole body cryotherapy’. Our presenter, Jim, was a tall man in his mid-twenties who worked as a sports scientist for one of London’s Premier League football clubs. I didn’t know anything about sports science and I have a considerable dislike of football, especially Premier League football. I wasn’t too unhappy, though. I was sipping a fancy Spanish beer and I had spied three platters of mixed sandwiches.
A total of forty people had signed up, but only fourteen people had bothered to show. It soon turned out that Jim was the only speaker; two other speakers had cancelled; it wasn't going well. The event was run by a chap called Stephen who also ran a series of ‘sports data’ conferences. I guessed that his free events were an opportunity to network and to try to drum up a bit of interest for his more exclusive events.
Jim’s talk had a number of different threads. One thread was all about using different tools to try to reduce footballer post-match recovery time: footballers were asked to wear gadgets that would send measured electrical shocks through their legs at regular intervals. Other players were asked to wear ‘activity watches’ which logged how much jumping up and down they were doing. I could see from one of the graphs that one player had obviously been out ‘on the town’ somewhere.
What struck me about Jim’s talk was the emphasis on science. His talk was packed with data and graphs. There were challenging phrases such as ‘neuromuscular properties’ and the ‘removal of metabolites’ which were apparently measured through blood tests. This was where sport, technology and medicine all combined. Athletes (or, players, as I call them) were described as ‘psychosociophysiological entities’ which intimates that sports scientists need to consider the bigger picture: the attitudes of the individual players and also (pretty obviously) how they interact with each other as a team. Every dimension of football was up for analysis and study. Although I continued to view football as something that was both boring and pointless, I was beginning to see that the challenge of maximising team performance was a complex and challenging problem. I had never thought of soccer in this way before. As Jim talked, my perspective was beginning to shift; I was starting to get interested.
Jim moved onto the intriguing subject of ‘whole body cryotherapy’. Cryotherapy is where footballers are asked to stand in a stupidly cold chamber for a couple of minutes, which apparently does something ‘positive’ to the body. An earlier version of this is to dunk the players into ice baths.
We were shown pictures of a ‘recovery menu’ and the design of a ‘player recovery space’. Whilst seeing these pictures, it struck me that sports science was interestingly interdisciplinary. You’ve got psychology, physics, biology, chemistry (in the form of nutrition), electronics, computing and even design and architecture.
Jim’s talk came to an end. Everyone clapped and wandered over to the area where the beers and the sandwiches were sitting.
I got chatting to a triathlete who confessed to be obsessed with measuring his performance, and a middle aged chap who used to do some consulting work for a premiership club. I learnt that Arsenal football club had bought out some kind of data capture and analysis company. I also learnt that there was a market for ‘post match’ data, not just for the media (to impress views with stats about how much running a player does), but also to help with the discovery of new players.
When it comes to sport, data is everywhere: it’s used before, during and after a match. Geeks, it seems, can now play a role in the success of a team. I also learnt that some teams would prefer not to share some of their sports science secrets. I saw the tension: science is all about sharing whereas sport is all about winning.
After drinking my third beer and eating yet another prawn and mayonnaise sandwich, it was time to go.
‘Do come again to our next event in January!’ said Stephen. ‘We’ll have more speakers on…’
As I left I wondered what other sports the group might focus on. Did they study tennis? How about rugby? It was then I realised I should have, again, taken the time to ask more questions.
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