Sports imPULSE

Football Helmets - Are They The Cure Or The Cause?

 Could an increase in head injuries and neurological problems in NFL players be an unintended consequence of making a better helmet?  Recent debates have shed light on studies supporting this claim. 

As obvious as the problem may seem, continuing revelations about the troubling mental declines of some retired players—and the ongoing parade of concussions during games—have created a sense of inevitability. Pretty soon, something will have to be done. Counterintuitive, or just plain dangerous? Wall Street Journal's Reed Albergotti discusses with colleague Chaz Repak why some experts think an NFL without helmets would vastly reduce on-field injuries in American football.

But before the debate goes any further, there's a fundamental question that needs to be investigated. Why do football players wear helmets in the first place? And more important, could the helmets be part of the problem?

While football helmets have reduced the chances of death on the field, they also created a sense of invulnerability that encouraged players to collide more forcefully and more often. As the game has become more physical it's increasingly likely that players are getting hit in the head more frequently.

What everyone has forgotten is that these small collisions may be just as damaging. The growing body of research on former football players suggests that brain damage isn't necessarily the result of any one trauma, but the accumulation of thousands of seemingly innocuous blows to the head.

One of the strongest arguments for banning helmets comes from the Australian Football League. While it's a similarly rough game, the AFL never added any of the body armor Americans wear. When comparing AFL research studies and official NFL injury reports, AFL players appear to get hurt more often on the whole with things like shoulder injuries and tweaked knees. But when it comes to head injuries, the helmeted NFL players are about 25% more likely to sustain one.

Here is the full WSJ article.

Snowtunnels

Most people need to have snow to do their winter sport of choice.  With the Snowtunnel, you can have winter fun year-round, well, that is if you live in or visit Dubai's lavish indoor ski slopes in the middle of the desert. The Snowtunnel is a fairly simple device mechanically - a corrugated steel drum that has refrigerant piped through it to cool the metal. When water is sprayed on the drum's interior, it quickly freezes. Then, a rider hops inside on a snowboard and sets the drum rotating at a speed they're comfortable with, catching an edge on the iced-over metal and riding it like a cross between a snowboarder and a tube-riding surfer.

Is Golf A Sport?

It's an age-old question debated in pro shops and pubs across America: is golf a sport? Neil Wolkodoff, director of the Rose Center for Health and Sports Sciences in Denver, thinks it is, and he has some data to back up his claim. Wokodoff took eight better-than-average golfers and tracked their heart rate, oxygen consumption, carbon dioxide production, and how far they were walking through a few rounds.

"The study shows there's significant energy expenditure in golf, more than bowling and some other sports it's been compared to," Wolkodoff said to the AP. "There are a lot of sports that don't have this level of energy expenditure."

Subjects walking and carrying their clubs burned 721 calories per round, while the lazy folks in the carts burned just 411. Surprisingly, there was no difference in carrying clubs versus using a push cart, so save your back and rent the cart. The data also suggested that players went past their anaerobic thresholds after walking through two uphill holes (feeling the burn).

So golf burns more calories than an hour of billiards (216), fishing (302), or even a relaxed canoe trip (345), but we're not sold that energy expenditure alone defines what a sport is. Everyone agrees that cheerleaders have bodies to prove they're burning calories, but good luck getting consensus on whether it's a sport. Curling only burns 345 calories during an hour of competition, but in Canada, it's not just a sport, it's the national pastime. Is Tiger Woods proof that golf is a sport, or is John Daly confirmation to the contrary? That probably depends on whether you've got a set of clubs in the garage.

Letterman's Top 10 Signs Your NFL Team Owner Is Nuts

We typically focus on sports technology on this blog, but couldn't help it given Bud Adams crazy antics this past weekend.

CBS' David Letterman: "The guy who owns the Tennessee Titans football team, 86-year-old Bud Adams, was fined $250,000 by the NFL for making an obscene gesture at Buffalo Bills fans during Sunday's game in Nashville. … And that's what he does when his team wins" ("Late Show," CBS, 11/17).

10) "Married to a tackling dummy."

9) "Team plays in North Carolina, builds new stadium in North Dakota."

8) "Only reason he hired head coach was because he had his own whistle."

7) "Encourages vendors to sell beer to players during game."

6) "Asked owner of Detroit Lions for tips on building a winner."

5) "He just tested positive for steroids – can you believe that?"

4) "Pregame pep talk – asks team to lose by more than seven-and-a-half."

3) "Thinks 'Things More Fun Than Reading the Sarah Palin Memoir' isn’t funny."

2) "His motto: 'If we want to win as a team, we need to shower as a team.'"

1) "Gives players the weekend off."

Exercising In The Heat May Help You Eat Less

Exercisers who are trying to cut calories might want to take a run in the sun instead of a climate-controlled gym.  A study conducted by the University of Western Australia’s School of Sports Science found that participants ate less immediately after working out in hot conditions—about 97 degrees Fahrenheit—than in a more moderate, 77-degree environment.

On average, the participants ate roughly 300 calories more when they worked out in moderate temperatures than when they rested in those same conditions.

For the study, which is published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the researchers had 11 young, regularly active men make several visits to the exercise lab.

During one visit, the men ran on a treadmill for 40 minutes in 97- degree heat; on another visit, they performed the same workout under 77-degree conditions. On a third visit, they rested in a moderately warm room.

In all three situations, the men were presented with an all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet after exercising or relaxing.

Overall, the study found, the men downed more calories after the moderate-temperature workout versus the resting condition, while there was no significant difference when they worked out in the heat.

The researchers then calculated the men’s relative calorie intake—which accounted for calories burned during exercise—and found that the hot workout looked even better. On average, the men’s relative calorie intake was almost 200 calories less compared with the resting condition.

The study also found clues as to why exercising in the heat may dull appetite. After the hot workout, the men typically showed higher blood levels of peptide YY, a hormone produced in the digestive tract that serves a “fullness” signal.

The men’s smaller appetites also appeared to be related to the increases in core body temperature that came with the hot workouts.  The reasons aren't clear, but one thought is that since the act of eating produces heat within the body, food intake is a natural mechanism for regulating body temperature.

There is something to be said for warmer climates.  However, one very important thing to note, exercise should not be performed in overly hot environments due to the risk of dehydration and heat illness.

Adidas To Make a One-Euro Sports Shoe For World's Poor

Adidas plans to make 'one-euro shoes' to offer to the poor and barefoot of the world, with pilot production to begin next year in Bangladesh.

Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus suggested the 'social business' project to the company, which normally focuses on trendy, expensive sportswear.

People in the poor world need products that are both affordable and manufactured locally, thus, creating jobs. The first Adidas non-profit shoes will be made in and for Bangladesh.

The product is to be sold at no more than the cost of materials and manufacture.

The Adidas move matches those by other multinational companies eager to show social responsibility, such as drug companies offering low-cost medicines in poor nations or technology companies trying to develop the '100-dollar laptop.'

Shoemakers have often been accused of exploiting workers in their developing-nation factories.  This is a big step changing that perception and creating a win-win scenario.

Employment Opportunities with Sports Manufacturers

For those interested, we were just notified of the following employment opportunities:

1.  Converse - Footwear Designer:  Duties will include the design and presentation of a wide range of footwear product across the Converse franchise portfolios of Converse Star Chevron (Basketball, Skate, and Lifestyle product) and Chuck Taylor All Star.

            http://www.coroflot.com/public/job_details.asp?job_id=24196  

2.  Puma (Germany) - Footwear Designer:  Create unique new footwear designs that address consumer, retailer and company needs on a seasonal timeline.

http://www.coroflot.com/public/job_details.asp?job_id=24200

3.  Speedo International (England) - Social Media Manager:  Help in getting more exciting content on their websites.  More detail at the link.

http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=172898724263&id=87691502056

Soccer Training Companian

As a former soccer player, I found this new m-station from Munin Sports absolutely fantastic.  There are drills one can do by themselves and there are other drills that simply require additional players.  The m-station solves that problem.  It is quite simply the best rebound technology that I have seen and enables user to practice numerous soccer drills individually or with a group.

The specially manufactured strings provide a serious amount of strength and explosive rebound.

The aluminum construction is light weight, easy to handle and won't rust

The tires are filled with foam and won't puncture.

You have to see the video to get the versatility of this product.  If you're a soccer (football) player, you will absolutely understand.

Know Your Sport: Gymnastics - Sticking The Landing

Nike has done it again.  They have created footwear reserved for normally naked feet. The Nike Pidima (Greek for leap) is something between a shoe, sock and slipper designed specifically for the vault. The intent is to add some artificial stick to attempts at sticking the landing. A forefoot rubber pad provides the function while a skin colored single strap around the heel is intended to maintain a minimalist form.

Know Your Sport: Gymnastics - Jumping and Jiving

It’s incredible what you can see at 500 frames per second. Tell someone to jump, and after asking how high, they’ll bend their knees to a point and then explode upwards and off the ground – down, then up. Simple and efficient. So why are the best gymnasts in the world adding an extra ‘down’ and ‘up’ when jumping on the spring floor and vault? The answer, lies in the floor.

In live footage, one might watch a gymnast on a spring floor and believe they jump just like we do (plus all those twisty things). But after a rash of injuries following the 2003 world championships held in the in the States, the USOC wanted to take a look at their equipment and ensure it wasn’t causing problems.

The USOC reviewed the high-speed footage of the athletes and the equipment in action.  Clicking frame by frame through the footage, they noticed an ever so slight, extra down/up in the athletes’ mechanics before launching. Even the gymnasts didn’t know they were adding the inefficient motion. They turned their attention to the floor itself and noticed that it was tuned incorrectly resulting in a rattling that caused the extra hiccup in the gymnast motion.

The little things do make a big difference, so the USOC has been testing various combinations of spring / foam floors which has offered some opportunity for improvement, but further research is necessary.  We've been writing on this blog for some time the importance of proper biomechanics and injury prevention, in this case the equipment exacerbated the problem, which went unnoticed without the help of high speed cameras.