We'll then keep you informed about what to do - though all you need to do is (sign up to iStadia for free then) post a blog, article or news item. Everything counts, because our banners on all of those pages will be used to raise money for Sport Relief.
Many thanks!
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Rob Robson
Co-founder, iStadia.com
Blog for Charity - Join our 'Sports Blogfest' for Sport Relief on 19-21 March
Improved Sport & Exercise Articles Pages
We're always trying to improve the site at iStadia, and we've just made some radical changes to the articles pages that we're sure you'll like.
First up, the layout has been improved, making it less cluttered. We've also provided a bit more data on each article to help people decide what to click. But possibly most important is that we've create pages that run off teh category, specialism and sport that you attach to your articles. So, if you attach an article to "Sports Performance", "Strength and Conditioning" and "Soccer", your article will show up in three additional pages: "Sports Performance Articles", "Strength and Conditioning Articles" and "Golf Articles". This should significantly increase the visibility of articles, while a simplified rating system will ensure that the best articles are easier to recognize.
Added to this, we've recently improved the positioning of our "Add this" tool which allows you to share an article, blog or news item. Since we've done that, hits from social media and bookmarking sites have increased dramatically - with views from Facebook ten times higher than before. All we need now is new content for people to share!
So all in all, there's been no better time to submit an article to iStadia. If you're looking for something to do during that quiet time between Christmas and New Year, why not write something?
Questions you may have: Should I still use tags? Yes, absolutely. In fact, you'll see that tags are more visible now than before. Can I go back and categorize my old articles? Yes - you can go back and edit any article, at the same time adding category data. If you do so you should get some new visits, so why not review the content while you are at it? Can I suggest new categories? Yes, please. If you can't find something that accurately describes your article please let us know.
Increased success a ‘virtual’ certainty for rugby players
Rugby players worldwide could benefit from a new virtual reality training programme created at Queen’s Belfast.
Team members from Ulster Rugby have been working with researchers in the School of Psychology at Queen’s on a range of virtual training scenarios that test expert players’ perceptual skills.
Lead researcher in the project is Dr Cathy Craig, a Senior Lecturer in Visual Perception who has previously collaborated with Adidas and top professional world class goal-keepers to study perception of curved free-kicks in football. She said: “Immersing players in an interactive virtual reality provides an exciting new way of exploring and understanding human behaviour.
“The advantages of this technology are that unlike playing a video game on a normal desktop computer, the rugby player or athlete is totally immersed in a realistic simulated environment. By presenting stereoscopic images in a head mounted display and tracking head movements, the user’s viewpoint is automatically updated giving a 360 degree virtual experience. This means that the user becomes totally absorbed in their virtual environment encouraging them to interact as they would in the real world.”
The players are fitted with a ‘backpack’ of sensors and don a helmet-like visor known as a head mounted display through which a series of 360 degree virtual scenarios are displayed.
Also involved in the project are PhD students Gareth Watson from Queen’s and Sébastien Brault from the M2S lab, University of Rennes 2. Gareth Watson added: “Our research is concerned with identifying the key events that influence decisions made by players on the pitch. By controlling the events presented to the players, we can see how the visual information available to the participants at any moment in time influences the player’s decision about when and how to act”.
For the researchers this type of research provides valuable insight into expertise and how visual information is used in the decision making process.
So far Ulster rugby players have taken part in two studies. Jeremy Davidson, Forwards Coach with Ulster Rugby said: “Working alongside the researchers in Psychology at Queen’s has provided us with a very useful visual coaching tool that can be used to develop a player’s peripheral vision. This is a vital aspect of a player’s game and we are looking forward to it improving decision making for our players in a real match setting.”
Special Olympics is recognized as the third member of the Olympic family. But unlike the Paralympics (which is for elite disabled athletes) it concentrates on community sport for all abilities. Special Olympics is all about year-round sports opportunities – not just an event every four years.
People with learning disabilities often lead their lives without ever realising their full potential because they don’t get included in the wider community. Special Olympics Great Britain gives us the chance to lead healthier lives, and build confidence and friendships. And by getting local people to volunteer, we’re starting to change perceptions of learning disabilities too.
You can help the Special Olympics by taking part in their latest initiative - Get Your Mascot Back. They have 'stolen' your football club's mascot and by donating you can help to get them back!
VISA Sponsorship Deal to Boost Team GB's 2012 Ambitions
Team 2012 was today (29/09/09) launched at the London 2012 Olympic Stadium, with leading payment system Visa announced as its Presenting Partner. It represents a huge new ambition for British sport, and is the largest national team ever sponsored, comprising approximately 1200 athletes from 47 sports and disciplines, Olympic and Paralympic alike.
Team 2012 will help realise the dreams and ambitions of all Britain’s Olympic and Paralympic athletes and is a groundbreaking partnership between the British Olympic and Paralympic Associations (BOA and BPA), the London Organising Committee for the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG), and UK Sport. The four bodies came together earlier this year to create this initiative for Olympic and Paralympic sponsors to get behind the nation’s top athletes aiming for London 2012 and beyond.
Visa Europe's sponsorship will help support sporting bodies as they provide the training and competition support needed for athletes aiming to become part of Team GB and ParalympicsGB at the London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games. The sponsorship deal, which runs through to 2012, is transformational for the partnership, ensuring Team 2012 is able to deliver on its ambition of providing extra funding for World Class Performance Programmes through a vital ‘third stream’ of private sector income, which will sit alongside existing National Lottery and Government funding, for our most promising athletes. The launch marks the start of a major long term fundraising drive through to 2012 and beyond.
Speaking on behalf of the partnership, LOCOG Chairman Sebastian Coe said: “Today’s launch of Team 2012 is a ground-breaking moment for British sport. Team 2012 will help bring to reality the dreams of future generations of athletes in competing at the very highest level. We are delighted to have Visa as the presenting partner and driving force behind Team 2012. Their support is vital and complements the crucial funding from the National Lottery and Government. Team 2012 will help ensure that as Olympians and Paralympians head toward London, they are properly resourced to do the job and make Britain proud.”
Visa has been a proud Olympic sponsor for over twenty years, and sees Team 2012 as an immense opportunity to increase the UK’s chances of Olympic and Paralympic success. Peter Ayliffe, President and Chief Executive Officer of Visa Europe commented: “As a worldwide partner of the Olympic Games since 1986, Visa is proud to have created such a prolific partnership with Team 2012. It will embody British pride, courage, effort and achievement and provides a unique opportunity for the country to get behind the UK’s best athletes and help them compete and win more medals than ever before. The athletes’ race for success doesn’t begin at the starting line, it has already begun, and Visa plans to support them every step of the way through Team 2012.”
The drive for private sector sponsorship of the World Class Performance Programme came from Government. Gerry Sutcliffe MP, Minister for Sport added: “This is a terrific vote of confidence by the business community in the work being done to give our medal hopefuls the best chance of striking gold in 2012. It is fantastic that Visa has stepped forward, and I am confident that this extra funding - building on the unprecedented levels of public funding for our athletes - will help our Olympic and Paralympic teams deliver even more medals in London.”
Ben Ainslie, three times Olympic gold medallist Sailor, said: "I am very pleased to support Team 2012, in particular its ambition to raise funds for athletes across all the Olympic and Paralympic sports not just in the build up to London but beyond 2012 as well. It is vital that we maximize not just our nation's medal opportunities at the Games but also the legacy that can be left in terms of the potential of future generations."
Darren Kenny, Paralympic multi gold medallist, said: “For the British Paralympic team, the home Games in London 2012 provides a fantastic opportunity to raise the profile of disability sport and hopefully encourage more people to get involved, either through playing it, coaching or volunteering. The extra funding from Team 2012 will help to ensure all British Paralympians and Paralympic hopefuls can do their best to win medals in London and make the country proud.”
Darius Knight, Table Tennis hopeful for the London 2012 Olympics, said: “I am really excited to be part of Team 2012 and playing my part in this unique opportunity to raise funds for high performance sport in this country. I’m hoping to make an impact in 2012 and I know that the extra funding that this scheme will bring, will help in ensuring that British athletes like me are best prepared when the Games come to London.”
Sophie Wells, Para Dressage hopeful for the London 2012 Paralympics, said: “Taking part in Team 2012 is something that I am really excited about. An opportunity to represent your country on home soil at a Paralympic Games doesn’t come around very often and it is important that programmes like Team 2012, which will help secure important funding for Olympic and Paralympic sports, make the most of this.”
For more details, including contacts, visit the BOA website
Making Money: Using iStadia's Social Media Platform for Sports and Fitness Businesses
iStadia is a powerful social media platform that, when used effectively, can be a very effective tool for marketing, whether you are a single handed sports or fitness consultant, an SME or even a corporate enterprise operating in the sports, health and fitness, or recreation arena.
Don't hesitate to ask me or Keith for any further help with using iStadia as a business tool or view the benefits of membership.
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Rob Robson
Co-founder, iStadia.com
Team GB Chef de Mission reflects on European Winter Youth Olympic Success
As the team prepares to fly home from the nineth European Youth Olympic Winter Festival (EYOWF) in Slask-Beskidy, Poland, Team GB Chef de Mission Mike Hay reflects on the performances of Team GB’s winter youth athletes:
“The EYOWF provides a fantastic opportunity for our young athletes to experience high-level competition against some of Europe’s leading winter sports nations. At the end of the nineth edition of the Festival, I am proud that our Team GB athletes performed well, winning two Olympic medals, resulting in Team GB’s best ever medal haul at this event.
Many of our athletes achieved personal best results and have learnt from the experience of participating at a multi-sport event. I wish all of them well as they embark on what we hope will be successful sporting careers.”
At the Festival's closing ceremony cross country skier Callum Smith, who achieved two personal best results at this competition was selected to carry the flag on behalf of Team GB’s athletes.
For further information and photo requests please contact Becki Middleton on 00 44 7884431518 or rebecca.middleton@boa.org.uk
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Rob Robson
Co-founder, iStadia.com
Get updates on Twitter@sportpsychrob
UK Sport announce first Garage Innovators Award
UK Sport’s Research and Innovation team have today announced the
first winner of their Ideas 4 Innovation: Garage Innovators Award. The
successful applicant is Alasdair Wylie, a Senior Consultant with
Frazer-Nash Consultancy in Dorking.
The aim of UK Sport's Ideas 4 Innovation programme is to develop an
award scheme to acknowledge and harness outstanding innovation concepts
for elite sport, generated by the UK's innovation and research
communities, to support the mission to London 2012 and beyond. There
are two competitions: the New Researchers Award - aimed at final year
and first year post graduate students - and the Garage Innovators Award
- open to any member of the public with creative ideas that may have
the potential to enhance the performance of British Olympic or
Paralympic athletes.
In its pilot year, the Garage Innovators Award received 57
applications, from individuals based throughout the UK, and with
diverse backgrounds, from engineering to sports science and the arts.
The award is primarily aimed at those individuals with a passion to see
the Great Britain team succeed, as the prize will enable the inventor
to realise their idea, whilst enabling UK Sport to utilise any outcomes
prior to 2012 during a period of exclusivity.
Six finalists were chosen to present their ideas to an expert panel
at UK Sport’s Head Office in London last week. The panel, who grilled
the hopeful applicants on their ideas, were UK Sport’s Head of Research
and Innovation, Dr Scott Drawer, Olympic gold medallist, Jason Queally,
Professor Steve Haake from Sheffield University’s Centre for Sport and
Engineering Science, Professor of Sports Science and former athlete,
Greg Whyte and engineering consultant to British Cycling, Dimitris
Katsanis.
Dr Drawer explains why Alasdair’s idea for a research project, on
the development of a novel device for performance enhancement in
canoeing, was chosen for the Garage Innovators Award, worth £25,000 in
research funding:
“The standard of applications for the Garage Innovators Award was
really exciting for this pilot year. Alasdair’s project excelled in its
simplicity, application and ability to directly impact on some of the
UK’s medal winning sports.
"His idea came from something he observed during the Beijing
Games. This really highlights how something can be taken for granted
when you are immersed in the environment day in and day out. We are
extremely confident that it could change the way people view the sport
in the future."
On being the first winner of the New Researchers Award, Alasdair,
who works for one of UK Sport’s Innovation Partner companies, said:
"Frazer-Nash always encourage us to be innovative in our approach to
problem solving and, following the launch of UK Sport’s Garage
Innovators competition, the company challenged us to come up with fresh
ideas of how we could help British athletes. Having thought about the
novel device for canoeing for some time now, I am really happy that we
now have the opportunity to make it a reality and have a positive
impact on some of the UK’s medal winning sports.
"Winning this award gives us the funding for the project and also
the access to those within the sport itself that will be key to making
it a success. I’d recommend anyone with an idea that can improve the
performance of British athletes to put it forward to UK Sport and enter
the awards next year."
Applications for the 2009 Garage Innovators and New Researchers
Awards will open in March this year. For more information on the New
Researchers Award for students or the Garage Innovators Award, please
contact Alison.Neall@uksport.gov.uk
As an interim step towards building a set of more coherent and engaging sub-communities within iStadia, we have started launching a number of new pages.
These are designed to push your content out further onto the web, and attract more people into the community who share your interests or may be potential customers. The stimulus for this was our Olympic News page that gained many thousands of hits this summer.
Over the longer term we plan to develop these further to create a greater degree of interaction around specific topics.
These will be extended further to include, strength & conditioning, leadership, sports marketing, as well as other sports .
What does this mean for members?
What it means is that when you create content (blogs/articles) it should reach a wider audience and achieve more views. It also means that the 'tags' are particularly important, as the blogs and articles included are done so by tags - so 'soccer', 'olympics', 'golf', 'tennis', 'nfl', 'college football', 'pychology', 'coaching' are important - as will be 'science', 'marketing', 'strength', 'conditioning' and 'leadership'. Clearly the titles of the pages are a clue!
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Rob Robson
Co-founder, iStadia.com
Mindsport's Mental Strategy Cards - Keep Performance Tips to Hand
iStadia member Sam Kotadia, through his company Mindsport Ltd, has just released a range of 'self-help' cards that will help you to keep mental strategies to hand at all times.
We are delighted to be able to offer these through the iStadia Marketplace.
52 Ways to Improve Sporting Confidence
Sporting contests at all levels are often won and lost by the smallest
of margins, and confidence can make all of the difference to
performance. This 'self-help' pack contains 52 power mental strategies to improve your confidence in sport.
The product also contains a unique symbol system suggesting the most
practical times to use the strategy. There are also "10 create your own
cards" that encourage you to write down your own personal confidence
triggers. The light-weight package allows use in almost any context,
strengthening its impact as a powerful confidence building tool.
The product also contains a unique symbol system suggesting the most
practical times to use the strategy. There are also "10 create your own
cards" that encourage you to write down your own personal focus and
motivation triggers. The light-weight package allows use in almost any
context, strengthening its impact as a powerful mental tool.
52 Ways to Improve Focus and Motivation in Sport
So much in sport revolves around key moments and turning points during
competitions. Losing focus and motivation at critical times always
damages performance.
The product also contains a unique symbol system suggesting the most
practical times to use the strategy. There are also "10 create your own
cards" that encourage you to write down your own personal focus and
motivation triggers. The light-weight package allows use in almost any
context, strengthening its impact as a powerful mental tool.
52 Ways to Mentally Prepare for Exams
Poor exam performance can be often traced back to a negative mindset,
usually in the form of stress, anxiety, and a lack of confidence.
The
pack contains 52 power mental strategies to help you prepare more
effectively for exams. The product also contains a unique symbol system
suggesting the most practical times to use the strategy. There are also
"10 create your own cards" that encourage you to write down your own
mental exam reminders. The light-weight package allows use in almost
any context, strengthening its impact as an effective exam preparation tool.
Join iStadia's Global Sport & Exercise Network today!
If you are not a member yet, registering is quick and easy! Click here for Quick Registration and keep up to date with what is happening in the community, network with and learn from iStadia's growing community of experts.
However if you are a sport & exercise professional or business and would like to promote yourself by building a detailed, search-engine friendly profile to attract potential clients, customers or employers, we recommend Full Registration.
Team 2012 was today (29/09/09) launched at the London 2012 Olympic Stadium, with leading payment system Visa announced as its Presenting Partner. It represents a huge new ambition for British sport, and is the largest national team ever sponsored, comprising approximately 1200 athletes from 47 sports and disciplines, Olympic and Paralympic alike.
The
pack contains 52 power mental strategies to help you prepare more
effectively for exams. The product also contains a unique symbol system
suggesting the most practical times to use the strategy. There are also
"10 create your own cards" that encourage you to write down your own
mental exam reminders. The light-weight package allows use in almost
any context, strengthening its impact as an effective exam preparation tool.
