Elite athletes are often subjected to endurance training in the environment in which they are chronically exposed to pollutants/irritants, allergens or cold air. These factors lead to an increased risk of upper and lower respiratory tract dysfunction. The diagnosis of asthma is crucial in elite athletes because of potential implications on athlete's general well-being as well as their competiti...

PURPOSE To anticipate outstanding athletic outcomes, the selection process of elite athletes simultaneously considers psychophysiological and technical parameters. This study aimed to investigate whether selected and nonselected athletes for the Italian national taekwondo team could be discriminated by means of sport specific performances and psychophysiological responses to training. PARTICI...

As I am writing this commentary on " The Experience of Depression during Careers of Elite Male Athletes " by Doherty et al. (2016) concurrently with the 2016 Olympics in Rio, the topicality of the paper is felicitous. A number of prominent Olympians, both male and female, have openly come out in the popular media and discussed their personal battles with depression, including English These pers...

Background: Coaches in elite swimming carefully design the training programs of their swimmers and are keen on achieving strict adherence to those programs by their athletes. At present, coaches usually monitor the compliance of their swimmers to the training program with a stopwatch. However, this measurement clearly limits the monitoring possibilities and is subject to human error. Therefore,...

Eating disorders can have long lasting physiological and psychological eVects and may even be fatal. Estimates of the prevalence of eating disorders vary greatly (1–62%) depending on whether they are based on self reports or clinical interviews, and on the athletic population investigated. However, existing studies are consistent in showing that symptoms of eating disorders and clinical eating ...

It is well reported that expert athletes have refined perceptual-cognitive skills and fixate on more informative areas during representative tasks. These perceptual-cognitive skills are also crucial to performance within the domain of sports officials. We examined the visual scan patterns of elite and sub-elite association football referees while assessing foul play situations. These foul play ...

PURPOSE Patellar tendon abnormality (PTA) on diagnostic imaging is part of the diagnostic criteria for patellar tendinopathy. PTA and altered landing strategies are primary risk factors that increase the likelihood of asymptomatic athletes developing patellar tendinopathy. Therefore, the aim of this study was to examine the risk factors that are predictors of the presence and severity of a PTA ...

OBJECTIVES The goal of this study was to perform a meta-analysis of the published literature to investigate the relationship of high levels of exercise training to left atrial (LA) size. BACKGROUND The "athlete's heart" is a series of cardiac adaptations to systematic exercise training and may include LA enlargement. METHODS We conducted a systematic review of English-language studies in ME...