A Letter to the 15,000!
Dear budding sport scientist So you have enrolled on a sports science degree eh? You start this week? Exciting times ahead then. So what lies ahead for you at the end of your studies? I believe sport is more important…
Tag Education
Lessons in inspiring and communicating ideas
I spent three days last week speaking, learning and being inspired at the Cheltenham Science Festival. Now in it’s 17th year, it is a roaring success, despite me having spoken there for the last three years! I contributed to three…
10 exam tips from high performance sport
As exam season looms for many students young and old, I wondered what we would see in the study rooms, mental-athlete village, warm-up areas and hear from the coaches pep-talks if exams appeared at the Olympics. Here are some thoughts…
Summary of 2018 Supporting Champions Conference
On 20 and 21 March 2018, ~180 delegates, partners and speakers gathered at the Emirates Stadium, London for the second Supporting Champions Conference. Which, once again, had an unadulterated focus on finding a better way to create remarkable performance and…
Using our intelligences through the prism of effectiveness
The tale goes that at a dinner with Wordsworth, the poet Keats, toasted “confusion to the memory of Newton…because he destroyed the poetry of the rainbow by reducing it to a prism”. Three years later Keats confirmed his disdain by…
Five books that changed my life
William Styron — ‘A great book should leave you with many experiences, and slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading.’ I love to read. When I read, I love to write in the margins (at…
Mind the gaps: An opinion piece about future needs in high performance
The inexorable rise in elite sport has done wonders for the soul in many ways. Who doesn’t appreciate the resilience of Sergio Garcia or the artistry of Marta? Who doesn’t enjoy the dizzying radiance of Simone Biles or the…
9 top tips to differentiate yourself in the crowded market of Sports Science
Students Get your head in the books You should be aiming for a 2:1 or a 1 class honours grade. I would encourage you to be striving for deep specialist knowledge in about 2-3 areas by the time you graduate.…
“What can you do to make the situation better?”
Before you read on, think of something that frustrates you, preferably something that really frustrates you (not someone, some-thing), keep it in your mind, now read on… ——- It had been brewing for maybe a decade, hanging there in the…
Performance Immersion
This is an excerpt from Chapter 1 of How to Support a Champion, picking up the first meeting with Sirs Matthew Pinsent (Four time Olympic Gold medallist) and Steve Redgrave (Five time Olympic Gold medallist) —- It was…