The use of performance analysis in Olympic and Paralympic sport: the perspectives of coaches and analysts

Performance analysis research to date has generally focused on understanding the best at the expense of how this information can be implemented within applied practice to benefit future performance (Mackenzie & Cushion, 2013). As such, the what, when, how, and why regarding the use and implementation of feedback and performance analysis within applied practice by the coach, performance analyst, athlete, or in combination, remains largely unexplored. Therefore, this PhD aimed to address the academic and applied need for empirically based understanding regarding the delivery of performance analysis and feedback within applied elite sport settings. Interview and questionnaire-based approaches were utilised to capture the views and opinions of elite coaches and performance analysts, i.e. those working with athletes who compete internationally at the Olympic/Paralympic Games and World Championships, regarding their current and desired delivery. Within Study 1, face-to-face interviews were used to explore the what, when, how, and why of the delivery of performance analysis practice. Data were collected from 23 performance analysts across various Olympic and Paralympic sports. The experience of the coach and the constraint of time had the most significant impact upon practice, with video, profiling and reports being highlighted as the stand out deliverables. Video feedback was usually coach led, whilst data delivery was more evenly distributed between coach and analyst. As the analysts tended to highlight the coach as the overriding feedback provider, Study 2 examined, 1) what coaches’ value within performance analysis, 2) how coaches utilise performance analysis and feedback within applied practice, and 3) the difference, if any, between experienced and inexperienced performance analysis users. Data were collected via an online questionnaire, which identified training goals, discussion and philosophy as the most prominent features influencing analysis direction. Additionally, coaches with greater experience chose to deliver significantly more feedback sessions within 1-hour of performance. Feedback sessions were primarily < 20-minutes in duration, delivered consistently according to a preferred schedule, face-to-face, within an individual format, and delivered using a balanced (experienced) or mostly positive (inexperienced) approach. Study 3 utilised a comparative approach to identify incongruency, if any existed, between coach and analyst, whilst offering areas of potential focus to facilitate greater alignment moving forward. Agreement on the provision, importance and need for full video was confirmed. The majority of analysts provided profiling often, or all of the time, however, despite its prevalence as a taught component of post-graduate performance analysis courses, only one third of coaches felt this was the required amount. Communication, or lack of in places, was identified as a key aspect potentially requiring additional focus. The empirical findings of this thesis have identified some of the key processes and practices delivered and desired by elite coaches or analysts operating within the applied Olympic and Paralympic environment. The various complexities within performance analysis as well as the numerous intertwining factors that impact upon practice have also been presented. The findings identified, as well as the questionnaires used within data collection should be utilised by analysts and coaches moving forward to, 1) facilitate information sharing between sports whilst offering the ability to ‘check and challenge’ processes, 2) offer an easily implemented and transferable method to facilitate intermittent review of practice, and 3) identify areas within practice potentially requiring development, thus ensuring continued applied impact

The ‘Lost’ Church of Bix Gibwyn: The Human Bone

Recent research for the Victoria County History (VCH) highlighted the presence of a ‘lost’ medieval church in Bix, a Chilterns parish north-west of Henley-on-Thames. The building, formerly the parish church of Bix Gibwyn, was abandoned in the late sixteenth or seventeenth century and has left no standing remains. Archaeological investigation by the South Oxfordshire Archaeological Group (SOAG) and Reading University has confirmed its location in a close called ‘Old Chapel’ in Bix Bottom, in the north of the parish. The rediscovery of the site – which contains the foundations of a hitherto unknown Romano-British stone building – sheds new light on long-term changes in local communications, settlement, and economic conditions. In the Middle Ages Bix Gibwyn church was a focus of religious and social life for a small rural community in the south Oxfordshire Chilterns. After the Reformation it was neglected, demolished, and finally all but forgotten. Its location has been a matter of speculation for over a hundred years,1 but in 2007–10 its churchyard was identified through a combination of historical research and archaeological fieldwork. Confirmation of the church’s location in the remote Bix Bottom valley provides important evidence about the medieval settlement pattern in Bix, which was very different from the modern one, and offers an opportunity to reassess the development of settlement in the southern Chilterns more generally. The archaeological findings also supply new evidence about Roman activity in the area

A case study of cumulus formation beneath a stratocumulus sheet: Its structure and effect on boundary layer budgets

On several occasions during the FIRE Marine Stratocumulus IFO off the California coast, small cumulus were observed to form during the morning beneath the main stratocumulus (Sc) deck. This occurs in the type of situation described by Turton and Nicholls (1987) in which there is insufficient generation of turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) from the cloudtop or the surface to sustain mixing throughout the layer, and a separation of the surface and cloud layers occurs. The build up of humidity in the surface layer allows cumuli to form, and the more energetic of these may penetrate back into the Sc deck, reconnecting the layers. The results presented were collected by the UKMO C-130 aircraft flying in a region where these small cumulus had grown to the extent that they had penetrated into the main Sc deck above. The structure of these penetrative cumulus are examined and their implications on the layer flux and radiation budget discussed

Effect of microstructure and temperature on the erosion rates and mechanisms of modified EB PVD TBCs

Thermal barrier coatings (TBCs) have now been used in gas turbine engines for a number of decades and are now considered to be an accepted technology. As there is a constant drive to increase the turbine entry temperature, in order to increase engine efficiency, the coatings operate in increasingly hostile environments. Thus there is a constant drive to both increase the temperature capabilities of TBCs while at the same time reducing their thermal conductivities. The thermal conductivity of standard 7 wt% yttria stabilized zirconia (7YSZ) electron beam (EB) physical vapour deposited (PVD) TBCs can be reduced in two ways: the first by modification of the microstructure of the TBC and the second by addition of ternary oxides. By modifying the microstructure of the TBC such that there are more fine pores, more photon scattering centres are introduced into the coatings, which reduce the heat transfer by radiation. While ternary oxides will introduce lattice defects into the coating, which increases the phonon scattering, thus reducing the thermal conductivity via lattice vibrations. Unfortunately, both of these methods can have a negative effect on the erosion resistance of EB PVD TBCs. This paper compares the relative erosion rates of ten different EB PVD TBCs tested at 90à ° impact at room temperature and at high temperature and discusses the results in term of microstructural and temperature effects. It was found that by modifying the coating deposition, such that a low density coating with a highly â  featheredâ  microstructure formed, generally resulted in an increase in the erosion rate at room temperature. When there was a significant change between the room temperature and the high temperature erosion mechanism it was accompanied by a significant decrease in the erosion rate, while additions of dopents was found to significantly increase the erosion rate at room and high temperature. However, all the modified coatings still had a lower erosion rate than a plasma sprayed coatings. So, although, relative to a standard 7YSZ coating, the modified coatings have a lower erosion resistance, they still perform better than PS TBCs and their lower thermal conductivities could make them viable alternatives to 7YSZ for use in gas turbine en

Resolving the electron temperature discrepancies in HII Regions and Planetary Nebulae: kappa-distributed electrons

The measurement of electron temperatures and metallicities in H ii regions and Planetary Nebulae (PNe) has-for several decades-presented a problem: results obtained using different techniques disagree. What it worse, they disagree consistently. There have been numerous attempts to explain these discrepancies, but none has provided a satisfactory solution to the problem. In this paper, we explore the possibility that electrons in H ii regions and PNe depart from a Maxwell-Boltzmann equilibrium energy distribution. We adopt a "kappa-distribution" for the electron energies. Such distributions are widely found in Solar System plasmas, where they can be directly measured. This simple assumption is able to explain the temperature and metallicity discrepancies in H ii regions and PNe arising from the different measurement techniques. We find that the energy distribution does not need to depart dramatically from an equilibrium distribution. From an examination of data from Hii regions and PNe it appears that kappa ~ 10 is sufficient to encompass nearly all objects. We argue that the kappa-distribution offers an important new insight into the physics of gaseous nebulae, both in the Milky Way and elsewhere, and one that promises significantly more accurate estimates of temperature and metallicity in these regions.Comment: 16 pages, 11 figures, 2 tables, published in Ap

Synthesis and evaluation of some novel nucleotide derivatives as potential anti-AIDS drugs.

Many nucleoside analogues are known to inhibit human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the causative agent of the disease acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). In order to act these nucleosides must be phosphorylated to their corresponding 5'-triphosphates, which can then inhibit reverse-transcriptase (RT), a key viral enzyme. These phosphorylations are catalysed by cellular kinases. The synthesis of a number of nucleoside 5'-dialkyl phosphates is described in this thesis, along with the results of the biological evaluation of some of these derivatives against HIV. It was thought that the 5'-dialkyl phosphates might have been able to act as prodrugs for the corresponding 5'-monophosphates. Firstly the synthesis of 5'-dialkyl phosphates of 3'-0-mesylthymidine, 3'-0-acetylthymidine and 3'-0-ethylthymidine is described, along with the synthesis of some 5'-dialkyl phosphates of 3'-azido-3'-deoxythymidine, 2',3'-dideoxycytidine and 2',3'-dideoxyadenosine. However, when tested, all of the above 5'-dialkyl phosphates were found to be inactive against HIV in vitro. It was thought that this inactivity arose from the metabolic stability of the simple dialkyl esterifying groups present in these compounds. With this in mind some nucleoside 5'-bis(2,2,2-trihaloethyl) phosphate derivatives were synthesised as it was hoped that 2,2,2- trihaloethyl groups would be more labile than simple alkyl ones. Both 3'-azido-3'-deoxythymidine 5'-bis(2,2,2-trifluoroethyl) phosphate and 3'-azido-3'-deoxythymidine 5'-bis(2,2,2-trichloroethyl) phosphate were found to be inhibitors of HIV in vitro. In view of these results, the synthesis of some 5'-bis(2,2,2-trihaloethyl) phosphate derivatives of 2',3'-dideoxycytidine and 3'-fluoro-3'-deoxythymidine was undertaken. The synthesis of some mixed 5'-(alkyl 2,2,2-trihaloethyl) phosphate derivatives of 3'-azido-3'-deoxythymidine was also carried out. The 5'-bis(2,2,2-trichloroethyl) phosphates of 3'-0-mesylthymidine, 3'-0-acetylthymidine, 3'-0-ethylthymidine and 3'-amino-3'-deoxythymidine were also synthesised. As 3'-azido-3'-deoxythymidine 5'-bis(2,2,2-trichloroethyl) phosphate was able to inhibit HIV in vitro, the 5'-bis(2-chloroethyl) phosphate and the 5'-bis(2,2-dichloroethyl) phosphate of 3'-azido-3'-deoxythymidine were prepared, in order to ascertain if these compounds were able to inhibit HIV also. The 5'-bis(2-chloroethyl) phosphate of 3'-azido- 3'-deoxythymidine does indeed display activity against HIV in vitro. An attempt was made to synthesise a thymidine 5'-dialkyl phosphonate species, by a Michaelis-Arbuzov type reaction between 5'-bromo-5'-deoxythymidine and diethyl phosphite. However, it was only possible to isolate a 3'-hydrogenphosphate species from this reaction. As the method by which 3'-azido-3'-deoxythymidine 5'-bis(2,2,2-trichloroethyl) phosphate acts as an inhibitor of HIV probably involves the hydrolysis of the phosphate moiety to either the 5'-monophosphate or the parent nucleoside, some studies on the hydrolysis of 3'-azido-3'-deoxythymidine 5'-bis(2,2,2-trichloroethyl) phosphate at a variety of pH were carried out