Sporting, financial and stock market performance in English football: an empirical analysis of structural relationships

This paper uses structural equation modeling to examine the linkages between financial performance, sporting performance and stock market performance for English football clubs over the period from 1995 to 2007. The results indicate that there is a strong correlation between financial and sporting latent constructs. Additionally, the study indicates that the sports managers seek to achieve a minimum level of profit and maximize sporting performance. This situation remains even when the club is owned by a group of investors. On the other hand, the confirmatory factor analysis and regression analysis show that financial and sporting factor scores are statistically correlated with stock returns, but not with risk.Management, Sports, Statistics

The potential role of genetic markers in talent identification and athlete assessment in elite sport

In elite sporting codes, the identification and promotion of future athletes into specialized talent pathways is heavily reliant upon objective physical, technical, and tactical characteristics, in addition to subjective coach assessments. Despite the availability of a plethora of assessments, the dependence on subjective forms of identification remain commonplace in most sporting codes. More recently, genetic markers, including several single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), have been correlated with enhanced aerobic capacity, strength, and an overall increase in athletic ability. In this review, we discuss the effects of a number of candidate genes on athletic performance, across single-skilled and multifaceted sporting codes, and propose additional markers for the identification of motor skill acquisition and learning. While displaying some inconsistencies, both the ACE and ACTN3 polymorphisms appear to be more prevalent in strength and endurance sporting teams, and have been found to correlate to physical assessments. More recently, a number of polymorphisms reportedly correlating to athlete performance have gained attention, however inconsistent research design and varying sports make it difficult to ascertain the relevance to the wider sporting population. In elucidating the role of genetic markers in athleticism, existing talent identification protocols may significantly improve—and ultimately enable—targeted resourcing in junior talent pathways

Aggregating multiple body sensors for analysis in sports

Real time monitoring of the wellness of sportspersons, during their sporting activity and training, is important in order to maximise performance during the sporting event itself and during training, as well as being important for the health of the sportsperson overall. We have combined a suite of common, off-the-shelf sensors with specialist body sensing technology we are developing ourselves and constructed a software system for recording, analysing and presenting sensed data gathered from a single player during a sporting activity, a football match. We gather readings for heart rate, galvanic skin response, motion, heat flux, respiration, and location (GPS) using on-body sensors, while simultaneously tracking player activity using a combination of a playercam video and pitch-wide video recording. We have aggregated all this sensed data into a single overview of player performance and activity which can be reviewed, post-event. We are currently working on integrating other non-invasive methods for real-time on-body monitoring of sweat electrolytes and pH via a textile-based sweat sampling and analysis platform. Our work is heading in two directions; firstly from post-event data aggregation to real-time monitoring, and secondly, to convert raw sensor readings into performance indicators that are meaningful to practitioners in the field

Phosphodiesterase Type 5 Inhibitors, Sport and Doping

Phosphodiesterase type 5 inhibitors (PDE5i) (e.g., sildenafil, tadalafil, vardenafil, and avanafil) are drugs commonly used to treat erectile dysfunction, pulmonary arterial hypertension, and benign prostatic hyperplasia. PDE5i are not prohibited by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) but are alleged to be frequently misused by healthy athletes to improve sporting performance. In vitro and in vivo studies have reported various effects of PDE5i on cardiovascular, muscular, metabolic, and neuroendocrine systems and the potential, therefore, to enhance performance of healthy athletes during training and competition. This suggests well-controlled research studies to examine the ergogenic effects of PDE5i on performance during activities that simulate real sporting situations are warranted to determine if PDE5i should be included on the prohibited WADA list. In the meantime, there is concern that some otherwise healthy athletes will continue to misuse PDE5i to gain an unfair competitive advantage over their competitors

Government involvement in high performance sport: An Australian national sporting organisation perspective

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between the Australian Sports Commission (ASC) and Summer Olympic National Sporting Organisations (NSOs) to determine the effect the relationship has on Olympic performance outcomes. Five Olympic NSOs were examined: Athletics Australia, Cycling Australia, Rowing Australia, Swimming Australia and Yachting Australia. All five NSOs represent sports in which Australia has consistently achieved strong results at previous Olympic Games. These NSOs receive significant funding from the ASC and, as such, are expected to achieve success at the Olympic Games. The ASC–NSO relationship was examined through an agency theory framework whereby the ‘contracts’ between the ASC (principal) and the NSOs (agents) were investigated through a survey, interviews and document analysis to identify potential management issues that may affect Olympic performance outcomes, such as agent or principal opportunism. The findings identified a lack of a collaborative high performance sport system in Australia, with the findings emphasising concerns over the ASC’s management of NSO programmes. While the ASC staff identified their organisation as the leader of high performance sport in Australia, the study’s NSO participants did not believe that the ASC had the capacity, capability and knowledge to fulfil this role.No Full Tex

Creating Stress-free Learning Environments for Sport and Physical Education

Exercise participation is usually recognised for its anxiolytic properties. However, performance anxiety in physical education and sport may also be faced by those students perceiving a negative difference between their degree of competence or self-worth in terms of sporting skill, and the perceived demands of a class activity, sporting competition, or training situation. While the response to feeling anxious is not always negative, anxiety usually results in a “fight or flight” response creating an elevated heart rate and a release of adrenaline preparing the body for action. Anxiety may serve as an in-built warning system for an individual student of their personal vulnerability in an upcoming activity, drill, or game situation. An inability to manage sporting performance anxiety can negatively impact a student's participation, enjoyment, and positive skill development, even deterring future exercise and sporting activities. The key to managing sport and exercise-related anxiety is achieving an optimal level. The teacher or coach needs to challenge students sufficiently to prepare mind and body for exercise, without an individual overextending into anxiety levels that create negative performance. Bringing together the disciplines of sport and physical education, we explore the nature of anxiety, and practical sports psychology techniques the teacher or sports coach can introduce to help students manage sports anxiety and create supportive learning environments. Helping students overcome sporting performance anxiety will assist them in performing at their best and will teach important skills they can apply for the rest of their future sporting and exercise activities

The effectiveness of orally applied L-menthol on exercise performance in the heat

During exercise in the heat, increasing thermal load leads to thermo-behavioural adjustments in exercise performance, due to greater perceptual and physiological strain. Behavioural reductions in exercise intensity in the heat are initially mediated via rises in skin temperature, which alter thermal perception (comfort and sensation) and later by rises in core temperature, which increase cardiovascular strain and perceived exertion. Therefore, thermoregulation may be ordered and dependant on the magnitude, timing and/or prioritisation of afferent signals. Non-thermal cooling via L-menthol has been shown to enhance exercise performance in the early and latter stages when delivered orally at a concentration of 0.01%. Indeed, during periods of progressive thermal stress, imposed by the combination of maximal exercise and environmental heat and humidity, L-menthol has been shown to offer an immediate cooling stimulus thus extending exercise capacity. However, repeated administration of L-menthol during exercise in the heat, as thermal load increases, is unable to recover a decline in work rate. Therefore, it is unclear whether the potency of L-menthol is sustained upon frequent application and what strategies are needed in both sporting and occupational settings to optimise its effectiveness. In this part of the symposium we will consider oral delivery of L-menthol and its potential for reducing an individual’s perception of heat stress with associated effects on exercise tolerance in the heat. We will also examine the frequency of use, optimal concentration, timing and novelty of L-menthol in a sporting and occupational context

Understanding problematic sporting stories: Narrative therapy and applied sport psychology

In this paper we examine how postmodernism can inform the practice of sport psychology. More specifically, we will discuss how a therapeutic approach known as “narrative therapy” can enable athletes to reclaim control over their sporting practices and eliminate problem stories undermining their performance

Modeling reinforcement structures in textile aimed at biomechanical purposes

While sporting, muscles, tendons and the body in general come under extreme loads which may lead to wrong movements and injuries which impact the performance or lead to mandatory rest. As athletes often wear compression garments, we investigate how reinforcement structures such as elastic bands, yarns or fabric strips with a given pretension, or rigid structures can be added to compression garments to prevent incorrect sport movements. This paper discusses how an existing simulation tool (DySiFil) can be adapted to be able to extract supportive forces and pressures and validates the findings for the case of overextension of the fingers and the thumb

Prediction Markets: Alternative Mechanisms for Complex Environments with Few Traders

Double auction prediction markets have proven successful in large-scale applications such as elections and sporting events. Consequently, several large corporations have adopted these markets for smaller-scale internal applications where information may be complex and the number of traders is small. Using laboratory experiments, we test the performance of the double auction in complex environments with few traders and compare it to three alternative mechanisms. When information is complex we find that an iterated poll (or Delphi method) outperforms the double auction mechanism. We present five behavioral observations that may explain why the poll performs better in these settings