Archivo de April 2010

Interviews with the elite

By Iñigo Mujika , el 29 de April de 2010

Victoria Pendleton´s website

Most recreational athletes and sports fans are interested in hearing the opinions of the great champions, the stories of their beginnings, their efforts to reach the heights they have reached, and their outstanding athletic achievements.

Over the years, I have been fortunate to interact one way or another with champions from different sports and countries, who have reached the elite level through paths sometimes “classic”, sometimes unsuspected, counting on a big support group around them or almost independently.

This is the reason why I have decided to start a series of “Interviews with the elite”, which will allow us to know the stories of great athletes first hand. However, as a sports physiologist and coach, I think athletes are not the only ones who have interesting things to say, so I intend to carry out interviews also with the coaches and sport scientists that in most cases contribute with their work to the success of the athletes they coach and support.

Our first invited guest will be the great British track cyclist Victoria Pendleton, multiple World Champion and Olympic Champion in Beijing 2008.

Victoria Pendleton (photo: ##http://www.flickr.com/people/33442021@N00##johnthescone##)

If you as a reader of this blog are interested in asking Victoria a question, you can do so by writing your question in the comment section of this post before May 7, 2010. From all the questions received, I will choose those that I consider more relevant and send them to her.

I would like to thank Victoria in advance for accepting to be the first guest of the series “Interviews with the elite”.

Nutrition in team sports

By Iñigo Mujika , el 22 de April de 2010

The fifth Sports Nutrition Conference was organised in Cala Serena, Mallorca (Spain) last December 2-3, 2009. In this beautiful setting we had an impressive line up of speakers, including Prof. Asker Jeukendrup, Prof. Tim Noakes, Dr. David Stensel, Prof. Mark Tarnopolsky and Dr. Kevin Tipton. At this conference, I presented on Team Sport Nutrition. Here is a summary of my presentation.

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What happens when you don’t start training?

By Iñigo Mujika , el 16 de April de 2010

A few days after writing my previous post entitled “Detraining (or what happens when we stop training)”, my good friend Brenda Barrett e-mailed me and asked me the question that has become the title of this new post: what happens when you don’t start training?

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Detraining (or what happens when we stop training)

By Iñigo Mujika , el 12 de April de 2010

According to the principle of training reversibility, regular physical training induces various physiological adaptations that improve sports performance, whereas cessation or a major reduction in training brings about a partial or complete loss of these adaptations, thus compromising sports performance. In other words, the principle of reversibility is the principle of detraining. The training process and competition plans of athletes are often disrupted by illness, injury, rest periods or other factors that may induce a reduction or stoppage of usual levels of physical activity.  It is therefore important to identify the effects and understand the mechanisms responsible for the changes that occur in an athlete’s physiological capacities and sports performance.

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