Busy summer for SINI athletes

As we move into the summer months, it is going to be a very busy period for most of the athletes at SINI. The long hours training in the strength and conditioning gym during the winter months, will hopefully pay dividend as the rugby players head off to Argentina for the U21 World Cup, the Hockey players travel to Dublin (women) and Rome (men) for the European nations Cup. The Gaelic players take part in the Ulster Championships at Senior and U21 level and the athletes look for improved performances over the summer to book places in the Commonwealth Games Squad heading to Melbourne in March 2006

There have recently been encouraging signs over the last few weeks with athletes breaking records albeit at a local level. Swimmer Melanie Nocher continues to improve and has recently broken the Ulster Junior record for 200m backstroke taking 3 seconds off the previous record. She also set two Ulster age groups records in winning the 400m individual medley and the 100m backstroke. These performances can come hard on the heels of Melanie setting a new Irish record in Limerick at the Longcourse Irish championship averaging well for the future.

Madeline Perry continues to move up the world rankings in squash with recent performances giving her a highest ever ranking of 12th and making her one of SINI’s truly world class athletes.

Matt and Russell McGovern are showing great signs of improvement in sailing 49er class. Recent performances in Palma and Hyer have put them just outside the world’s top 25 and with additional support should achieve this position over the summer period.

Finally two young athletes Rhiannon McNally and Laura Kerr have been breaking local records and personal bests in recent weeks in the hammer and javelin respectively. Rhiannon has twice posted throws in excess of 50m – an improvement of over 5m on her previous best whilst Laura posted the second best throw ever by a Northern Ireland athlete.
The summer period also sees some athletes complete the period in SINI with new athletes lined up to replace them. It will be interesting to monitor their performance over the next few years which will hopefully reflect what they learnt during their time at SINI.

All athletes will soon be invited to a review meeting at which the new performance indicators and targets for 2005 – 06 will be set. On a practical note, individual photos will be taken to enable new car park passes to be distributed to athletes for the new season.
Finally coaches on our new high performance database by now will have received invitation to attend a seminar on Monday 23rd May when Dr. Istvan balyi will discuss ‘Tapering for Competition’. The seminar is being held at the University of Ulster in Jordanstown.

A previous newsletter article outlined the results of a pilot study that utilised the Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) device to track the movement patterns of a referee during the Ulster Minor Football Final that was played at Croke Park last summer. The study, which was conducted by SINI physiologist Declan Gamble and facilitated by Dr Eugene Young (Gaelic football high performance manager - HPM), provided performance data including speed, heart rate (HR), time and total distance covered. In summary, the results provided objective information, which enabled a conditioning programme to be designed to better reflect the energy demands of refereeing a game of Gaelic football. At SINI, the potential of integrating this system into the physical preparation of Gaelic football, hockey and rugby players was therefore examined.

Prior to the departure of Mrs Sally Bell (hockey HPM), it was agreed that the GPS system would be incorporated into the hockey programme to facilitate monitoring of the Ulster based Irish internationals during their physical preparations for the European Championships. This conditioning phase also presented an excellent opportunity to integrate some of the knowledge obtained from a recent visit to Celtic Park. Subsequently, a programme was designed by Declan Gamble and Phil Moreland, which mainly incorporated extensive and intensive small sided games to develop sport specific endurance. Furthermore, the addition of high intensity aerobic intervals (e.g. using a skills running track and short sprints), interspersed with these games, could potentially elevate fitness levels even further. Some of the physiological results from the first two training sessions are presented below.

Figure 1 illustrates the HR profile associated with performing a speed and agility warm-up, three extensive endurance games, a running track and some short interval sprints. The mean HR during the games was 89% of maximum. The total distance covered in the training session was 6786 m and the distance within each speed zone is illustrated in figure 3. Colours yellow, blue, and red represent, standing/walking, jogging and high intensity running, respectively, while the other colours illustrate various speeds of sprinting. An example of the running track is presented in figure 4, and the colours refer to the different speeds associated with performing the track.

Figure 5 illustrates the combined HR (in red) and speed profile (in blue) obtained from session two.

This training session included a speed and agility warm-up, two intensive small sided games and running tracks and some short interval sprints. The mean HR for the session was 88% of maximum.

Declan Gamble

Recovery covers a complex range of processes which include:

• Refuelling the muscles and liver of their expended energy
• Replacing the fluid and electrolytes lost in sweat
• Allowing the immune system to deal with any damage caused by the exercise bout
• Making new proteins, red blood cells and other cellular components

After a hard session, whether it was an interval session involving short bursts of exercise that quickly depleted your glycogen stores, or a prolonged endurance session, your goals are to get those muscles re-synthesising glycogen and replace fluids lost in sweat as soon as possible for fast recovery.

Refuelling ….
There is lots of evidence to show that carbohydrate-rich foods and drinks taken immediately after hard exercise will refuel your muscle glycogen stores quicker than if you delay eating, which is really important when your next session is less than 24 hours away. This will mean being organised to have suitable foods and drinks available – in your kit bag if necessary. Appetite is often suppressed after a hard session, so it is important that you choose foods that are easily digested and use fluids that contain carbohydrate to kick start the refuelling process. Including protein in your recovery snack will help muscle growth and conditioning, especially after strength training sessions.

Practical guidelines

Each of the following selections in Table 1 and Table 2 give approximately 50g carbohydrate. You should consume 1g carbohydrate for every kilo you weigh within ½ hour of stopping exercise to ensure speedy recovery of glycogen stores, and repeat this after an hour or until normal meal patterns are resumed. The intake of protein (10 – 20g) will also help meet goals for muscle growth and conditioning.

Table 1 50g carbohydrate snacks giving at least 10g protein

• 500mls of low fat flavoured milk drink
• 200mls carton yogurt drink and large banana
• 2 slices bread in sandwich with meat/chicken/egg filling
• average bowl of breakfast cereal with 200mls low fat milk
• 2 tubs of low fat yogurt
• sports bars (check the label)
• cereal bar and 1 tub low fat yogurt
• 5 jaffa cakes and 1 tub low fat yogurt
• small tin baked beans with 2 slices of toast
• average baked potato with grated cheese
• 1 slice thick crust pizza

Table 2 50g carbohydrate snacks

• 800 – 100mls of isotonic sports drink
• 1200mls sugar-containing fruit squash
• 500mls fruit juice drink or fresh orange juice
• 2 handfuls of sultanas
• 2 handfuls of jelly babies, wine gums, fruit pastilles
• standard bar of Turkish Delight
• 3 jaffa cakes and 2 fig rolls
• 2 – 3 cereal bars
• 2 slices white bread with jam or honey
• 2 pancakes with jam, honey or syrup
• fruit scone with jam or honey
• 2 slices currant or malt bread with jam or honey
• soft white roll with banana
• 3 rice cakes with jam or honey
• low fat yogurt and banana
• 1 tub (150g) custard and 3 tablespoons tinned fruit

Rehydration ….
Replacing fluid that you have lost through sweating must be replaced so as not to slow up the recovery process. Starting the next session in a dehydrated state will reduce the quality of your training. Sweating is an individual thing and the amount athletes’ sweat varies a lot. A previous newsletter article (Go with the flow … the facts about fluids (February 05)) explained how to work out how much fluid you lose as sweat during an exercise session. Use this as a guide to how much you need to drink after your workout.

Practical guidelines

• ensure an adequate supply of cool palatable drinks is available
• rehydration should start immediately with half or full strength isotonic drink. A fluid that contains some sodium (salt) and carbohydrate provide faster body water replacement than plain water, is more palatable and helps refuelling
• drink to a plan; do not rely on thirst to determine needs
• remember that fluid continues to be lost during recovery through urine losses and ongoing sweating
• alcohol should not be taken in the recovery period as it can increase urine losses
• where possible, post-exercise activities that promote sweat losses eg hot spas, saunas and exposure to the sun should be avoided

Ruth Wood-Martin
Accredited Sports Dietitian

This month Performance Lifestyle Manager Peter McCabe includes an article about one on the Institute’s new younger athletes. The aim is to illustrate some of the typical issues faced by a young school age athlete as they try to fit everything into their life. The need for organisation, the need to make choices, the need to maintain discipline, the reliance on external and family support, the application of talent, the signs of performance progression, the hopes of future success.

The alarm clock goes off at 5.00 a.m.; she leaves the house at 5.30 and hits the water at 5.45. It’s particularly difficult in the chill of dark winter – but for a performance swimmer it has got to be done…part of the quest to make the Beijing Olympics in 2008. Melanie Nocher has had six years to get used to the routine but in reality it doesn’t get any easier, train until 7.30, back to snatch a quick breakfast as she gets ready for school, and then it is off to Strathern by 8.35. Her focus then switches to A Level studies with Biology, Geography and Home Economics competing for attention. Every portion of the school day must be productively used as study periods give a valuable opportunity to keep on top of work easing the burden of homework later in the day. After school it’s off to the pool again or the gym to complete some land based training. “The exception is a Monday when I devote some extra time in the afternoon and evening to Biology, currently my weakest subject” says Melanie. “Most other days I finally get home around 7.30 p.m. for some dinner, homework and then bed before 10.00 p.m. It can be difficult coping with the accumulating tiredness but I try to stay motivated”. At present Melanie, who has a stream of Junior records behind her is targeting the Commonwealth Games to be held in Melbourne next March. She hopes to qualify to add Commonwealth selection to her growing list of achievements that include being the youngest ever member on the Irish Senior Swim Team when she competed at the European Championships in 2003. Melanie’s event is backstroke with the 50m, 100m and 200m disciplines all within her range.
“Weekends are usually taken up by competitions or further pool sessions. On Sunday’s I do double sessions 8 to 10 and again 5 to 7. There’s certainly not much time for socializing, too many late Saturday nights would really throw my programme off course!” she laughs, “Seriously though, I am aware of the impact on training so I have to keep going out to a minimum”.
Commitment and discipline have to be at the core of everything Melanie does, if her dreams are to be realized.

Recently Melanie has been selected to become an athlete at the Sports Institute Northern Ireland. This enables her to access a wide range of support services in areas such as sports science, sports medicine, conditioning, performance and lifestyle management. “I’m very grateful to the Sports Lottery Fund for making this possible and while the Institute does bring extra demands I’m hoping that the services will help me move to the next level” she says.
Melanie is currently ranked number one in Ulster in both short (25m pool) and long (50m pool) course events. Her immediate challenge is to grab one of the four swim places in the Commonwealth Games team for Melbourne. “The aim is to post as fast times as possible and hold my place in the local Commonwealth rankings until the selection is finalised. I’ve already got the qualifying time but that in itself is not enough, you still have to be in the top four when the selection is made” she says. She has already tasted competition down-under during the Commonwealth Youth Games in Bendigo, Australia last December. Melanie made the final of all her events with her best performance coming in the 50m backstroke where she finished just out of the medals in fourth position. “I really enjoyed the environment in Australia” said Melanie, “It would be great to return for the Commonwealths next year”. Last summer was also special as Melanie travelled to Greece to participate in an Olympic Youth Camp during the Athens Games themselves. Only two young athletes from each country were invited to a memorable two weeks. “I saw the opening ceremony and attended competition in a number of sports – swimming of course, but also hockey, basketball and beach volleyball. The scale of the event was almost overwhelming but we were given a very privileged position and I also enjoyed being able to build friendships with a range of other young athletes. Maybe we can renew some of those friendships at a future Olympiad, hopefully as competitors!”

The prospects seem good for Melanie, but first there is the need for more hard work – in the pool, in the gym, and critically in the realm of academia given that examinations are imminent. “I would really like a career with a link to sport and as I want to go to University after school I will soon be considering my options. My decision will also need to consider the best training environment to help me progress”.
“Currently I am benefiting from the support I get at the Sports Institute and things are going well” she states. “My only real regret is that since my training has increased I have had to stop my piano lessons. I play at Grade 5 level and had the same teacher Mrs. Graham, for the last nine years. I was committed, and only missed two lessons in all that time, but it had to go if I was going to try to take my swimming on to the next level”. Driven commitment is a quality Melanie displays in abundance. She takes her inspiration and determination from achievers such as legendary cyclist Lance Armstrong and recognizes clearly that the motivation has to come from within. She is appreciative too of the support she gets from her parents. Dad Alan, with a successful business career behind him has transferred his skills and knowledge to help with the administration of Swimming in Ulster. “Dad didn’t have a background in swimming, but got involved to help the work the Governing Body were doing” says Melanie, “I think he liked it when I started to win” she adds with a smile. “My parents are really supportive with organisation, transport and even the simple things like ensuring my meals are sequenced to facilitate my hectic time schedule. I’d like to continue to do well for myself, but also I know it would make them really proud too”.

The next two years will be a crucial phase for Melanie….Ulster Swimming is hopeful that their ‘golden girl’ can deliver.

Potential Commonwealth Games team members James McIlroy, Paul Brizzel, Michael Allen and Ben Houghton recently attended the UK: A preparation camp in Grosetto, Italy.
Athletics High Performance Manger, David Reid and SINI Physio Phil Glasgow took the opportunity to watch the ‘Coach – Athlete’ pairings inaction. The venue was chosen after it successfully staged the world cup Junior Championships last year.

McIlroy had an excellent indoor season, setting three new Northern Ireland records, and finishing forth at the European championships. Coached by Tony Lester (former coach of Olympic silver medallist Roger Black) James looks to have improved again, and will look forward to his first competition of the season in Hengelo at the end of May.
Paul Brizzel and Mike McFarland worked hard on the technical side of Pauls sprinting. Brizzel found it useful to spend this elongated period of time with his coach, as well of availing of UK: A’s recovery strategies.

Allen and Houghton were coached by former world Javelin record holder Steve Backley. Steve helped make big improvements in their run – ups during the camp as well as competition tapering. All four athletes will be in action at the Northern Ireland championships (incorporating Commonwealth Games trials) at the Mary Peters track on the 11th June