47 A discussion with Dave Collins, Professor & Director of the Institute of Coaching & Performance, University of Central Lancashire. Topics discussed include: what it’s like to be a sports psychologist, talent development, performance analytics, technique change, bridging the gap between research and practice, and the role of social media in research. Download link More…

4. A look at my recovery from my 100 miler and some recovery science. Two race reports: The Elephant Mountain 50K and the Tucson Marathon. What was my secret to qualifying for the Boston Marathon? Does talking to yourself and using mantras while running really help your performance? How should your self-talk change for the…

46 Do athletes perform better when they talk to themselves? Should the talk be motivational or instructional? Positive or negative? Does it work for both novices and experts? Download link Articles/links: The influence of self-talk on the performance of skilled female tennis players Self-talk influences vertical jump performance and kinematics in male rugby union players…

3. My weeks in training including my “Get Me Home” workout, a race report from my first attempt at a 100 miler – The Coldwater Rumble. How did it go? What did I pack in my drop bags? What did I learn and would do differently? An introduction to the constraints-based approach (aka non-linear pedagogy)…

45 News: A look at a few recent journal articles. Do soccer players and referees sometimes see an event that never really happened? Can a basketball player detect where a dribbler is headed using sound alone? Is doing exercise in front of a mirror effective? Download link Articles: Seeing the unseen? Illusory causal filling in…

2. First full episode of the podcast featuring a look at my Forest Gump “I just felt like running” training philosophy, a race report from the San Tan Scramble 50K, introducing ultra, trail running as a complex system, and questioning the validity of the common advice: “don’t do anything new on race day” Download link…

44 Why does the presence of others change the performance of an individual athlete? Why is this social facilitation effect sometimes good and sometimes bad? Does it matter whether the other people are observing, evaluating or performing the same action? Does being “observed” via activity monitoring technology facilitate performance? Download link Articles/links: The Dynamogenic Factors…

1. An introduction to the Ultra Running Science & Superstitions podcast hosted by Professor Rob Gray from ASU. Highlights the main features that will be covered including: (i) Race reports from the South West region of the USA, (ii) training stories and updates, (iii) running science, and (iv) examining the myths and superstitions of running….

43 Should the goal of practice be to reduce movement variability to as low a value as possible? Is high variability the signature of an unskilled performer or a necessity for effective learning? Download link Articles/links: A schema theory of discrete motor skill learning Feedback-Induced Variability and the Learning of Generalized Motor Programs Optimizing generalized…