ACSM Winter Olympics Expert Commentary

Death raises questions about luge track, Canadian competitiveness

A collective cry went out at the Main Media Centre this morning when video featuring the horrific crash of Georgian luger, Nodar Kumaritashvili was broadcast into the main hall.

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Luge death and risk of injury in Olympic sports

Expert addresses yesterday's luge death and safety questions raised

By Gregory Fox, ACSM-certified professional and former bobsled/skeleton competitor

Yesterday's tragic death of an Olympic luger is a reminder to all how dangerous the sliding sports can be. In Bobsled, Skeleton and Luge, safety seems minimal when athletes wear nothing more than a helmet and a spandex-like suit. Nothing could be further from the truth; even at 90 mph, this is enough protection for most incidences. The greater safety precautions come from the years of training these athletes go through. In the USA, Luge athletes are recruited between the ages of 11-14. Starting off athletes while they are young, will help them gain the years of experience and confidence that’s needed to succeed at these sports.

The run in Whistler is the newest in the world. As required for the homologation (certification) of the track, many test runs have been made prior to these Olympic Games. In 2008, both the FIBT and the FIL (the governing bodies for the sliding sports), approved the track for international competition. One year ago, all three sports held World Cup events at the Whistler Sliding Centre. In any sport injury can be inevitable.  Today’s unfortunate event was a rare occurrence that illustrates the unpredictability of sport.

News from the Games: Olympic luger from Georgia dies after crash

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP)—A men’s Olympic luger from the country of Georgia died Friday after a high-speed crash on a track that is the world’s fastest and has raised safety concerns among competitors. IOC president Jacques Rogge said the death hours before the opening ceremony “clearly casts a shadow over these games.”

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Analyzing Lindsey Vonn’s injury

By Jeffrey A. Ross, DPM, M.D., FACSM

Associate Clinical Professor, Baylor College of Medicine

 

Imagine you are a runner, and you have been experiencing shin splints during your training for a marathon. You know what it feels like. A sharp gnawing pain along the tibia, and extending along the posterior tibial tendon, and the inside of the ankle. Sometimes it hurts even when you are not running. Only rest, ice, and biomechnical correction seems to help calm the area down.

 

Now imagine you are skiing and you fall with your body moving forward over the top of your boots. Imagine the stress to the tibia as you fall and land over your skis. I know this feeling because it happened to me when I was much younger ski racer back in my native New England. The pain can be excruciating. It's a miracle Lindsey Vonn did not suffer a boot-top fracture from her fall Feb. 2 in Austria.  According to an article in the New York Times (Thursday, Feb 11), the slalom course had been injected with water to make it harder and more slippery. After the injury, Vonn could not walk for two days. She was diagnosed with a deep tissue bruise with no nerve damage.

 

Even with a deep muscle bruise, the injury could have caused a compartment syndrome. Fortunately, it did not. But now imagine every time Vonn leans forward and her shin pushes and rubs against the boot, she will probably experience pain. And with high speeds, and holding the skiers edge, she's bound to place incredible g-force against that boot. Obviously, she will be performing with some pain. But with physical therapy, icing and topical pain and anesthetics she should be able to compete. The question will be at what level can she compete? Olympics skiers compete at such a high level that thinking about the pain, or altering your leg to avoid the rub against the boot, can cost thousandths of a second. That can make the difference between a gold medal and an also-ran.

 

Hopefully Vonn can grin and bear it and still come out on top. She's a fierce competitor with a previous elbow injury, and still competed in the World Cup. I think she will be the heroine of the Vancouver Olympics.

News from the Games: WADA follows through on vow to crackdown on drug cheats

VANCOUVER and WHISTLER - Anti-doping officials are promising the toughest drug testing yet during the Vancouver Olympics, and they say more than 30 athletes have already been caught in the months leading up to the Games.

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Functional movement & Olympic athletes

By Nicole Pelletier, CSCS

 

In the past five years, strength training has shifted from training individual muscles to training movement patterns, which has been coined ”functional training.” For example, using a leg-curl machine to isolate knee flexion for hamstring strengthening can be replaced with leg curls on a stability ball, which not only focuses on hamstring strengthening but also glute activation, rotational stability and pillar stability. Thus, muscles accompanying the hamstrings in athletic movements are activated through the stability ball leg curl – a functional exercise.

 

In the May 2006 edition of North American Journal of Sports Physical Therapy, Gray Cook, Lee Burton and Barb Hoogenboom stated that many strength and conditioning programs address strength, speed and agility, but lack in addressing quality and efficiency of movement patterns.  Movement patterns found in athletics involve squatting, lunging, reaching and rotating. Optimal movements require proper joint alignment, mobility, stability and symmetry when executed with varying degrees of force through all planes of motion. All aspects of optimal movement are required in sport and are addressed through functional training.

 

With the movement toward functional training, assessing movement patterns prior to strength training has become essential. The National Academy of Sports Medicine includes the squat and single-leg squat as part of their functional assessment for athletes. Gray Cook and Lee Burton created the Functional Movement Screen™ (FMS) to identify movement deficiencies, muscle weakness and imbalance. The FMS consists of seven basic movements: squat, lunge, hurdle step, shoulder mobility, pillar stability, active straight leg raise and rotation. Both of these screening methods can provide quantitative information to help create functional based programs that improve the movement quality and efficiency in athletic movements.

 

Focusing on training movement patterns versus individual muscle groups not only applies to strength training but also to improving overall athletic performance. Women’s Olympic Hockey player Angela Ruggerio, as reported by Boston Globe’s Shira Springer on January 17, 2010, began training with a more functional approach over the summer as she prepared to enter her fourth Olympic games. Her workouts focused on movement pattern efficiency and form (functional training), which improved her speed, agility and power development. Angela reported making the largest power and strength gains in her Olympic career, returning to the Olympic training camp stronger than her younger teammates.

 

Athletes like Angela are noticing large strength and performance gains with less time lost due to injury with implementation of functional training techniques. Therefore, should all athletes participate in a functional movement screen as part of their pre-participation screening and focus a portion of their training regimen on improving movement patterns to increase athletic performance?

Bioenergetics and the Olympic Athlete

By Mark Deaton, CSCS

We all desire to be bigger, faster, stronger – but how do we get there?

Some people look to the $400 billion supplement industry, while others take a more natural approach. Bioenergetics is the term used for the interactive energy systems within the human body and how energy is expended through exercise. It is defined as the conversion of protein, carbohydrates and fats into biologically usable energy that can be used for muscular activity (Powers, S.K, Howley, E.T. 2009, p 23). Fueling a working body is as vital to training and performance as gasoline or electricity is for an automobile. Some may think understanding the biochemical components of each food isn’t necessary, as long as you “just eat it!” But we know food comes in various nutrient levels; therefore, it would be best to understand proper nutrition. It is critical for an athlete to have a better understanding of bioenergetics to increase the efficiency of their personal performance (Powers, S.K., Howley, E.T. 2009, p. 23-24).

The three energy systems are: 1) Phosphagen (ATP-PC) – responsible for producing energy for the first few seconds of any athletic event; 2) Glycolysis – continues energy production from 30 seconds to three minutes into the athletic event via the breakdown of carbohydrates from blood glucose or muscle glycogen stores; and 3) Oxidative (aerobic) – produces energy after three minutes until the event ends or fatigue limits the performance. The primary source of energy produced by these three systems is adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Depending on the intensity and duration of the athletic event, these energy systems will interact with one another and even revert back and forth on a continuum of ATP production. An example would be a sprint at the end of an endurance event where a crossover effect to fast glycolysis will occur (Baechle, T.R., Earle, R.W., 2008, p. 22-36). Educating yourself on the effects of certain nutrients and their combinations will provide a potential natural advantage that your energy systems will utilize.

So, what do you need to know? Educate yourself as an athlete and as a health professional who works with athletes regarding bioenergetics and proper nutrition for performance. Before recommending or taking supplements, reevaluate training principles (overload, progression, etc.), and supplement safety. Analyze current calorie-to-protein intake from natural sources (Hoffman, J. 2010, SSTC). Chances are you may find an area to manipulate slightly that could result in a more productive performance.

POST YOUR COMMENTS:

How does your food intake affect your performance?

Knowing the sport-specific demands of your sport, how have you manipulated your training and nutrition?

What are your thoughts on nutrient timing (pre-event, post-event) and what foods are ingested?

 

References

Baechle, T.R., Earle, R.W. (2008). Essentials of strength training and conditioning. National Strength and Conditioning Association. 3^rd edition.

Hoffman, J. (2010). Sport-specific training conference. National Strength and Conditioning Association.

Powers, S.K., Howley, E.T. (2009). Exercise physiology: Theory and application to fitness and performance. 7^th edition. McGraw-Hill, New York, NY.

News from the Games: Top rivalries to watch in Vancouver

The Winter Olympics kick off Friday, and ESPN.com's Howard Bryant, Jim Caple and Bonnie D. Ford preview the top rivalries to watch once the flame is lit in Vancouver.

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News from the Games: Aussies win appeal on women's bobsled entry

VANCOUVER, British Columbia — Australia's two-woman bobsled team may compete at the Vancouver Olympics after winning its appeal Tuesday before the top sports court.

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Performing at High Altitudes

By Jordan Guillot, ACSM Health Fitness Specialist

 

Varying altitudes may propose a new challenge for athletes competing in the Winter Olympic Games. As the elevation above sea level increases, not only does the barometric pressure of the air decrease, but the pressure of oxygen in that air also decreases (Exercise Physiology, McArdle, Katch, and Katch, 6^th ed., 2007).

 

This decrease in pressure of oxygen becomes that new challenge. The diffusion of oxygen from inspired air in the lungs across a membrane and into the blood stream depends on a pressure gradient (from area of higher pressure to area of lower pressure). As blood flows through the body, muscles and other tissues utilize the oxygen, which decreases the pressure of oxygen in the blood stream before returning to the heart. Once this blood reaches the lungs from the heart, its pressure of oxygen is much less than that of the inspired air.

 

This difference in pressure allows diffusion of oxygen from the greater pressure inside the lungs and into the area of lower pressure – the blood stream – to be delivered throughout the body. The blood leaving the lungs is what is commonly known as the oxygenated blood, and is vital to muscle and tissue function. At higher altitudes, as mentioned before, the pressure of oxygen is lower than at sea level, and that pressure continues to decrease with every increase in elevation. If the pressure of oxygen lowers in inspired air, the difference in pressures between the inspired air and the blood stream would decrease, also. This decrease in difference lowers the rate at which diffusion takes place. Thus, a decrease in oxygen saturation of the blood can be expected. Now the muscles have an inadequate supply of oxygen, which inevitably affects and decreases performance than what can be expected at sea level or at lower altitudes.

 

Olympic Winter Games rules state that a downhill skiing course must have a vertical drop of 800-1100 meters (2600-3280 ft.) (FIS Ski Rules 2008, 79). This is more than enough vertical distance for the start and finish to differentiate in their pressures of oxygen. However, there is a question of how much oxygen pressure change effects might come into play. Given these events are relatively brief and as a consequence, is a substantial part of the needed energy generated by anaerobic pathways?