Athos

Unlocking the key to the perfect squat

At Athos, we’re always striving to gain deeper insights into the human body. To do that Athos partnered with ProActive, an elite sports performance institute that trains some of the top athletes in the world. We threw the ... Read More

Athos @ the NFL Combine

Leading up to the end of February college football players prepare for the NFL combine. FastTwitch and Athos showed how ... Read More

Return to Play with Athos

Have confidence in your return to play decision making. It’s nearing the end of regular season and one of your best play... Read More

Athos Measures Muscle Specific Training Load

Many coaches and sports organizations are taking a scientific approach to both designing programs and monitoring athlete... Read More

Athos Q&A: Kirk Lacob

Athos Contributor

<h2 id="kirk-lacob-assistant-general-manager-golden-state-warriors">Kirk Lacob, Assistant General Manager, Golden State Warriors</h2> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-25%20at%209.12.05%20AM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> The Golden State Warriors Championship rosters weren't built overnight. There are architects, otherwise known as the General Managers, Coaches and their staffs, who have poured much of their life's work into building out those rosters. Greatness always comes with risk. A team like the Warriors doesn't achieve two Championship titles and three NBA Finals appearances in three consecutive years without taking risks. Those architects use the team's most precious resources, their athletes, to test new theories and use new innovative technology with the hope that the data and insights that technology brings will give them just the edge they need to build a legacy. For Assistant General Manager at the Golden State Warriors, Kirk Lacob, taking risks on innovative technology comes naturally to him. He's a young forward thinking thought leader in the Sports Performance Technology space and a former Stanford graduate with ties to Silicon Valley. For Kirk, it's a calculated risk when it comes to testing out new technology that's going to help his team stay at the top. The Warriors have used their developmental team in Santa Cruz as a testing ground to assess what they'd like to integrate into the next level to help them win. We sat down with Kirk to pick his brain about his experience using Athos with the Santa Cruz Warriors, how he's gone about driving player adoption and where he thinks the future of this unique space is going. <h2 id="embracing-the-competitive-edge">EMBRACING THE COMPETITIVE EDGE</h2> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-25%20at%209.08.34%20AM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> What drew you to Athos? KL: I think what originally drew me to Athos was I’ve always looked for something that I call noninvasive. It might not be the right term, but that’s what I always called it. Part of the problem with traditional wearables, and it’s not any of the faults of these companies, it’s just where the technology was, but you’d have to wear these bulky sensors and that’s an issue. If an athlete notices something is on them, it’s going to impact them even if it really shouldn’t. You know, having a large sensor like on your chest can’t actually affect your ability to run but there’s a psychological component to all this stuff and if an athlete feels uncomfortable, they’re not going to perform the way they normally would or they’re going to blame the sensor if anything goes wrong. So what I think is great about Athos is that you developed something that you’d be wearing any way. These athletes are used to wearing compression gear. That’s key because our goal is to have something that really doesn’t impact their ability to do what they need to do but still gathers data. And that’s what first drew me to Athos and obviously the science behind the scenes, the data analysis is really intriguing. Why is it important to know muscular stress? KL: I think muscular stress is one of those things we just don’t know a lot about with players and it's key. We’re really good about knowing how they feel after, especially after an injury, like really good at getting imagining and seeing exactly what’s going on or running a stress test. We’re ok at knowing what’s going on beforehand, we can run all sorts of baseline tests, but we don’t know a lot yet as a whole about what’s going on while an athlete is working out. I think that’s really important because if you can say this is how an athlete looks before they start, that’s great you know pretty black or white if they should be doing this activity. But what we need to know is where is that red line? Where is that yellow line? How do we know when they can maybe push themselves and get a little more out of this activity. But most importantly, we don't want to get them to a point where they can potentially get injured or re-injured. So it’s a very fine line and this is helping to define that line which I think is very important going forward. Why implement Athos at Santa Cruz? KL: Santa Cruz was a perfect fit for Athos because it really is our testing ground in a lot of ways. One of the top things I like to say for people who work for us in Santa Cruz is “Be aggressive, go out and do things. I’m going to give you a lot of autonomy.” I don’t even work there anymore, I just kind of oversee it to make sure things are going the right direction. But, we’ve told all of those people when you make a mistake, it’s ok. This is not a million dollar mistake, don’t go out there and be reckless, but if you make a mistake, it’s ok just like it’s ok in real life. But these are thousand dollar mistakes instead of million dollar mistakes. So it’s given us a chance to try things. Also, the way that league is, it moves so quickly, it allows us to rapidly prototype. We have more practices there than we do here. How important is technology's role in Return To Play efforts? KL: As an Assistant General Manager, it’s my job to get athletes healthy and to Return To Play. We need to win games and to win games we need to have healthy players. Anything we can use to get an edge is very important. I think if I put on a different hat and that’s my fan of the game hat, I just want people healthy. I want the best players playing, I want them playing a lot and I want them playing all the time. What you don’t ever want to see is a great player go down with an injury that could’ve been potentially avoided. So the more information we have on these guys, the better. Does technology give you an edge on the competition? KL: I think so, I think it’s really important because there are so many moving parts in sports and the reality is you want to make the best most informed decisions you can. Technology allows us, in a lot of different ways, to come up with objective measures of really anything. When it gives you an opportunity to gather more data, you’re giving yourself better information. Doesn’t mean you’re going to make a better decision, it’s still on you, but it gives you the data to potentially make a more informed decision. <h2 id="adapting-to-technology-in-the-front-office-culture">ADAPTING TO TECHNOLOGY IN THE FRONT OFFICE CULTURE</h2> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-09-06%20at%205.01.41%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> How do you get athletes on board? KL: I think that’s a really important question, how do we get guys to buy in? The most important thing is you can’t attack every situation as if it’s the same. You can’t go to every player or every coach with the same message because everyone is different, they think about things differently because of past experience. It's important first to get your messaging right and to know the subject that you’re approaching, but as a general rule of thumb you use similar thought process, "I can tell you that this won’t hurt you." Then you prove it to them. Explain that none of this will hurt you, but it might help you. And if they can make that leap of faith then that’s great, that’s your first starting point. Then the next thing becomes if it might help you, this is how exactly it might help you and you really have to empower them to use that data. Then the last thing is really putting an emphasis on the fact that we don’t want anything invasive, athletes are inherently thinking of things all the time. There's’ a psychological component to everything they do and you don’t want to make them feel distracted so it’s very important that you come to them with a plan and an idea where they can see some sort of actual results but also aren't going to be bothered by it while they’re competing or training. How do guys like Andre and Steph act as tech advocates on the team? Having guys like Steph and Andre who are real forward thinkers is great because not only are they usually open to trying new things or even bring new things themselves to the table, they’re also internal champions with other athletes and there’s no better referral than from an athlete to an athlete. Even better if they say they've seen whatever improvements here or there that they might attribute to it, that’s really key. What metrics have you been monitoring with your athletes? KL: We’ve tried to monitor as much as we can of course with the caveat being only with the players who are comfortable with it. For now, that’s really all in practice which is a limited data set so we’re mostly getting baselines during pre seasons when we practice the most. We’ve measured as much as we can with these guys whether it’s heart rate, vo2 max type of things, respiratory system, we’ve measured things relating to movement, speed and compared that to historical data to see if someone is accelerating quicker, faster or slower. But, it is hard given some of our current issues and frankly, the final thing is we need the players to buy in. If they don’t want to buy in that’s fine, it's completely their decision. But I think it’s important long term that we continue to get more data in those areas. We do rely on what I call inferred data which is obviously not medical as much as it is movement based. So a lot of that is just cameras to optically track and then kind of infer loads based on things that we already know about a player's body. There’s a lot of margin for error there but that’s really what we’re doing today and our hope is we continue to run more beta tests in Santa Cruz and hopefully one day things will be improved throughout sport across the board and athletes will feel comfortable using this data on their own. <h2 id="thoughts-on-the-intersection-of-sports-and-technology">THOUGHTS ON THE INTERSECTION OF SPORTS AND TECHNOLOGY</h2> What does the Sports Performance Technology future look like to you? KL: I think it’s going in a really, really cool direction. Obviously, there’s going to be a lot of legal issues around a lot of this because the data is coming from other people and people have rights to their own medical data. But I think the best part is we’re getting better technology that gives us less of a margin for error and more concrete good data. That can only be a good thing, I think it's going to also help us learn more about how the human body works and I think goes well beyond basketball or sports. These are obviously large resource institutions but if we can continue to produce things that work at scale, why couldn’t we go and use these things in some other medium and help everybody. So that’s kind of my long-term pie in the sky goal is to hope that some real good comes out of this for the world, and if not we’ve got really cool things that we can use for basketball. What would you love to see improve or advance quicker in this space? KL: There are probably two places I’d put an emphasis on. One is the sensor side and that’s actually gathering the data. That’s going to continue to improve and I think that’s going to be great because it’s going to give us a smaller margin of error and it’ll give us more accurate information which will allow our decisions to be a little more informed. The other side is actually analyzing the data. There are so many great things happening in the data science world, whether you look at things like AI machine learning or you look at just large data manipulation. We’re getting better at actually sifting through this giant data set. That’s really key, you can have as much data as you want but if you don’t know what to make of it, it’s completely useless. You might as well not invest in it. So what I think is great is we’re starting to see larger data sets over a larger period of time which means that we’re probably not going to have small sample size theater over here. At worst, we might find there are still large blips, but we’re also able to better analyze it and more quickly. I think real time analysis is going to become really big at some point and that’s exciting too. If you're interested in using Athos to empower your training check out the <a href="https://www.liveathos.com/product-facility">Athos Training System</a>.

Athos Q&A: Dr. Scott Lynn

Athos Contributor

<h2 id="dr-scott-lynn-associate-professor-california-state-university-fullerton">Dr. Scott Lynn, Associate Professor, California State University, Fullerton</h2> When it comes to an athlete’s training and development, people think of fields, courts and gyms as the critical places where the most work happens. Professors and Scientists spend a lot of time in labs to understand the science that goes into an athlete's training and movement and this information needs to be filtered down to the athletes and coaches to make it useful. Dr. Lynn will tell you that knowing what's going on inside of an athlete's body during training can make all the difference when it comes to game-time performance. Professors like Dr. Lynn devote countless hours to better understanding exercise prescription for elite athletes by studying the kinematics and kinetics of human movements in both clinical and sports applications. Dr. Lynn is well known in the sports world by trainers and researchers who have spent time in his Biomechanics Laboratory at CSU Fullerton in order to gain a deeper understanding of sports science. When it comes to having an expert opinion on all things sports science, Dr. Lynn is a key partner we work with to study the effect of EMG on athletes in training. His dual undergraduate degrees in Physical, Health Education and Life Sciences from Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada and his MSc and Ph.D. in Orthopedic Biomechanics made him a perfect fit to dig deeper into the muscular stress placed on athletes during training. We sat down with him to pick his brain about his experiences using Athos in his lab with athletes in training. <h2 id="why-dr-scott-lynn-partnered-with-athos">WHY DR. SCOTT LYNN PARTNERED WITH ATHOS</h2> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-29%20at%203.02.09%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> What attracted you to Athos? SL: I was very interested in Athos as they were attempting to take a very valuable research tool and clinical tool (EMG data) and get it in the hands of many more people to help them with athletic performance and injury prevention/rehabilitation. The challenge of presenting EMG data in a way that would make it useful for every individual was extremely interesting to me and an excellent opportunity for knowledge translation of all the great research that has been done using EMG data. What sets Athos apart from the rest of the technology out there in this space? SL: I believe Athos is the only commercially available product that can give access to the internal (muscular) load required to product external work. I was extremely skeptical of Athos when I first saw the product, as collecting good EMG data can be a real challenge even in the most controlled laboratory setting. However, I was amazed once I was able to work with the team at Athos and see the quality of the raw data that the system was able to collect. I’m not aware of any other consumer product that is able to collect EMG data of this quality. The accelerometers in the cores that are in the shirt and the shorts are also very exciting as they can provide kinematic information that can really help in the interpretation of the EMG information. <h2 id="sports-performance-technology-in-action-at-california-state-university-fullerton-biomechanics-laboratory">SPORTS PERFORMANCE TECHNOLOGY IN ACTION AT CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, FULLERTON BIOMECHANICS LABORATORY</h2> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-29%20at%203.02.55%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> What happened when you started using Athos Training System? SL: When I first started using the Athos technology, I was amazed at how extremely easy it was use. Many of our studies with Athos have also incorporated standard sports science research tools (isokinetic dynamometer, research grade EMG system, 3D motion tracking system, force plates, etc). During these data collections, most of the issues we had were with the other systems and not with Athos. How did Athos EMG technology compare to research grade EMG technology? SL: We are still in the process of evaluating the data from this study but it appears the Athos system is very much comparable to the information provided by our research grade EMG system. Have you used it on yourself? SL: I have used the Athos training system and it has helped me to identify some muscular imbalances that I have been working on improving. <h2 id="evolving-from-collecting-data-to-decision-making">EVOLVING FROM COLLECTING DATA TO DECISION MAKING</h2> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-29%20at%203.02.37%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> What’s the biggest upside of being able to access EMG data insights from an Athletic Trainer and Strength & Conditioning standpoint? SL: Athos can really give the AT and S&C coach access to the quality of movements that their athletes are performing. Once an athlete or a patient is prescribed an exercise program, it is difficult for the coach/therapist to monitor every repetition to ensure proper muscular activation strategies. Athos gives coaches/therapists access to information that can really help tailor exercise programs for each individual and get the most optimal results. How can Athos help coaches get athletes to Return to Play quickly as well as to maintain player availability? SL: Athos can help coaches monitor muscular imbalances that can build up over time and cause injury. Athos can be used to monitor the internal load on the athlete not only in the gym but on the field of play as well which can really help identify inefficient movement patterns that may cause injury. It can also be used to evaluate movement pattern correction exercise to see if these exercises are indeed activating muscles appropriately to manage muscular imbalances and not make them worse. <h2 id="future-of-training-with-technology">FUTURE OF TRAINING WITH TECHNOLOGY</h2> What would you say to someone who is resistant to using technology in sports training? SL: I understand those who are resistant in using technology in sports training as many technologies provide too much information without context that can be extremely overwhelming. Our goal with Athos is to provide simple information that is easily understood by all type of users; however; this has been a great challenge. We’ve been working very hard to overcome this obstacle and I’ve seen great improvement in the information provided to users by Athos in my time using the system. I’m confident that, through the research Athos is doing, the interpretation of the information will continue to improve and provide extremely useful information to all users. Where do you see the intersection between sports performance and technology going in the future? SL: Technology has begun to take over many aspects of our lives and sports are no different. If interpreted appropriately, more analytic information about how our bodies are working can only help to keep us healthy and improve athletic performance. Do you think EMG will become mainstream? SL: If you asked me this question several years ago, I would have given you an emphatic “No” answer. I didn’t think it was possible to collect good EMG data outside of a very controlled lab setting. Athos has most certainly changed my opinion on this question and with continued improvement of the Athos product; I think it is very much possible that EMG can be used across various aspects of human performance.

Athos Q&A: Yo Murphy

Athos Contributor

<h2 id="yo-murphy-director-of-sports-performance-aspi-training">Yo Murphy, Director of Sports Performance, ASPI Training</h2> A well-known quote repeated by many great coaches throughout the decades reads: <blockquote> “Success is when preparation meets opportunity.” </blockquote> This is a quote Yo knows a thing or two about as preparation is something that he preaches after his own fourteen-year stint playing professional football. No athlete lasts over a decade playing professional sports if they don't know how to properly train and take care of their body. We all see the glory in the games, but what we often don't see is the hard work and long hours put into training in the weight room and on the field. Yo is very intimate with the details of those long days in the weight room and the tedious drills on the field getting footwork down. You've got to be the best to beat the best and Yo knows that first hand. That's why he's now dedicated his second career to training up and comers as well as established professionals at his facility in Florida using innovative technology. He uses his expertise to help athletes attain the level of performance and fitness they need to excel. He works closely with college athletes who are preparing for combines and with professional athletes preparing for the season. Yo preaches hard work done off the field to help the on the field performance because he's lived it and can attest to its success. Athos sat down with him to pick his brain about how he's used Athos to enhance his training programs for athletes at ASPI. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-31%20at%2012.09.33%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> <h2 id="why-yo-murphy-invested-in-athos">WHY YO MURPHY INVESTED IN ATHOS</h2> How did you land on Athos? YM: I have always been motivated to give athletes the best possible service to help them ensure longevity in their sport. After hearing about the capabilities of Athos I knew it would be a tool that would assist me in doing that. What happened when you started using Athos Training System? YM: I think there was an immediate response in the weight room when the coaches and especially the players could see what muscle was firing as opposed to what muscle should be firing. When we saw this it allowed us to make adjustments, whether it was a different coaching cue or the athlete actually using the real-time picture as a visual aid to assist him in completing the correct firing pattern. What were you hoping Athos could help solve? YM: 1.) Monitor muscle usage and balance on injured athletes to see and adapt how my programming was impacting them 2.) Figure out what is the perfect amount of Total Volume for an athlete in our program (LOAD). We have always adjusted based on size or position but before Athos, that was just an educated guess. Now we can assess with confidence. <h2 id="in-action-at-aspi-training">IN ACTION AT ASPI TRAINING</h2> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Redskins.jpg" alt="alt alt alt"> What metrics have you been monitoring? YM: I have been working on getting numbers on using training load, the total and by muscle group, for each athlete. It’s useful to compare these between position groups since I program Bigs and Skill players differently. Anything surprising? YM: I think the most surprising thing with the Online Training Center is that you can get whatever data you need to monitor balance/imbalance and progressions/regressions overtime. <h2 id="evolving-from-collecting-data-to-decision-making">EVOLVING FROM COLLECTING DATA TO DECISION MAKING</h2> What type of decisions can you make with Athos data? YM: We can make sure that if we have a speed day scheduled in the weightroom vs. strength we are accomplishing our primary goal. If we need to adjust the percentages, time or tempo for the following week and for a particular athlete, Athos helps to uncover this. This is only one thing in a long list of decisions I’m able to make using Athos. What trends surfaced? YM: A popular trend we’ve uncovered with Athos is the lack of Glute Activation in probably about 70% of our NFL Combine athletes. Do athletes understand the value? YM: The biggest thing I feel that flips a switch for them is showing them data of where they started and then showing them the improvements in their data overtime. That has a direct correlation to the improvement they see in their performance. How has Athos helped you get athletes to Return to Play? YM: When an athlete gets close to being able to get on the field, it’s so hard to see the compensations with the human eye. Athos shows us exactly how our players are moving and what the prime movers are during these movements to help us feel more confident with our decisions to return them to play. <h2 id="future-of-training-with-technology">FUTURE OF TRAINING WITH TECHNOLOGY</h2> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-31%20at%2012.09.47%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> What would you say to someone who is resistant to using technology in sports training? YM: The correct technology is the greatest asset to your program. Also, data collection shows the improvement of the athletes which ultimately help sell your program. What are the benefits from knowing muscular stress? YM: There is a lot of great insights in knowing muscular stress from day to day and week to week. I feel there is so much value in matching the overall stress at the end of your program life cycle to estimate when you start your taper and exactly what it should consist of.

Athos Spotlight: John Branham Jr.

<h2 id="working-to-redefine-greatness">WORKING TO REDEFINE GREATNESS</h2> Athletes in the 21st century have truly redefined what greatness is. The Kobe’s and Tom Brady’s of the world have shown younger generations what it takes to be legendary in sports. The price? Just short of obsessing over perfection. With an obsession to chase perfection comes a relentless desire to always have an edge on the competition. In the ever evolving world of big data and technology that we live in, athletes and coaches have flocked to sports performance technology as a resource. The Athos Training System has been committed to helping athletes of all levels reach their fullest potential in their quest to be great. Athos does this by leveraging sports science and data insights to inform training decisions. When it comes to outworking competition, Athos gives athletes the confidence they need to know they’re doing everything in their power to optimize performance. <h2 id="meet-john-branham-jr-">MEET JOHN BRANHAM JR.</h2> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-30%20at%202.22.17%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> A high school junior by the name of John Branham Jr. is an aspiring three-sport athlete with dreams of playing at a higher level. John Jr.’s ambitious goal to earn a college scholarship is something he’s willing to go to any length to achieve- even if it means obsessing over perfection. <h2 id="iron-sharpens-iron">IRON SHARPENS IRON</h2> John Jr. is a bit different than your average high school athlete. His work ethic alone sets him apart from most. In fact, his dedication to chasing greatness has caught the attention of one of his favorite professional athletes. After a Twitter exchange, John Jr. had the opportunity to train alongside one of his idols and all-time NFL greats, Pittsburgh Steelers’ Linebacker, James Harrison. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-30%20at%202.22.24%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> Training with James gave John Jr. an exclusive perspective into what it takes to succeed at the highest level. He knows that in order to excel in sports, he must go above and beyond to take advantage of all the resources around him. <blockquote> “When you know you are in shape and have pushed to failure in the gym, you know you will be good in game.” says John Jr. </blockquote> <h2 id="train-smarter">TRAIN SMARTER</h2> A new competitive space has arrived for athletes, and it’s not just based on who performs the best, but who trains smarter. John Jr.’s biggest support system, his father, has encouraged him to seek out ways to leverage technology to enhance his training. <blockquote> “Today you have to have a mix of elbow grit and technology. Technology to work smart and elbow grit to build character.” says John Branham Sr. </blockquote> After spending some time researching online, John Jr. had yet another Twitter exchange that resulted in a life changing experience. He reached out to Athos founder, Dhananja Jayalath, to learn more about this up and coming sports performance technology. Dhananja sent over information about Athos Training System and John Jr. decided to purchase some gear. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-30%20at%202.22.35%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> <h2 id="empowered-by-athos">EMPOWERED BY ATHOS</h2> Over the past few years, John Jr. has used Athos consistently and all of his coaches and mentors have found immense value in the Athos data. John Jr. has been focusing on extracting value from Athos by monitoring the Live View during his workouts. He does this by analyzing each of his movements, in real-time, to ensure he’s engaging the appropriate muscles during each individual rep, and correcting himself as needed. For example, he noticed an improvement in his squats and deadlifts from actively monitoring which muscles were firing during the movement with Athos. He realized that he could be activating his glutes more and his hamstrings less. Once he made that adjustment to clean up his overall muscle contributions and balance, he’s been able to increase weight. <blockquote> “Athos lets John Jr., his trainers and myself know when he's not going to the max. You can't cheat it, the only way to cheat it is don't workout. Using Athos, you really don't need a trainer to push you because you know if you are doing it right or not.” says John Branham Sr. </blockquote> <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-30%20at%202.22.44%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> Leaning on his coach's eye to detect inefficiencies, overtraining and compensation issues weren’t the most effective ways to ensure consistent gains. Being able to catch these issues, and also making adjustments on the fly, are factors that have helped him to grow bigger, faster and stronger in the last few years. For the first time ever, John Jr. has been able to quantify his training by looking at the data the Athos Training System provides with respect to training load, muscle contributions and imbalances. Looking at the data points and searching for trends of regression and progression allow him to feel confident knowing he’s training smarter. Tracking these trends creates an internal competition that pushes him to go harder and continue to outwork himself. <blockquote> “Honestly, some days I don't feel like working out and I would give 75% or less. When I got Athos, it was fun to watch my work translate to the live-view. It was almost like playing a video game and it just made me want to go harder each time.” says John Jr. </blockquote> <h2 id="leveraging-athos-to-conquer-goals">LEVERAGING ATHOS TO CONQUER GOALS</h2> John Jr. believes that Athos has helped keep him healthy and optimize his day-to-day performance. This, in turn, helps him achieve his sports performance goals. He’s had some promising conversations with a number of division one schools that are interested in recruiting him to play for a college scholarship- which is the big picture goal for John Jr. While he’ll be the first to tell you that he has more work to do, he’s confident that Athos is going to help him make his dreams a reality. If you're interested in using Athos to empower your training check out the <a href="https://www.liveathos.com/athletes">Athos Training System</a>.

Athos Spotlight: FC Dallas

Athos Contributor

<img alt="Skylar Richards - FC Dallas" src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/fc-dallas/OP_Skylarheadshot.jpg" width="100%"> With a minute left to play, one of FC Dallas’ most dynamic playmakers tore his right achilles tendon while back peddling on the field. Prior to the injury, this star player had logged his single-season career best in games played, minutes and assists. Being a passionate and competitive athlete, he was eager to find a solution that would help him return to play as soon as possible. After undergoing surgery to repair his torn achilles, he had Skylar Richards and Athos there to help him return to play in a timely manner. <h2 id="skylar-richards">Skylar Richards</h2> Richards has eleven years in the MLS and six years with FC Dallas under his belt and oversees the physiologic measurement and analysis of all seven of the full-time FC Dallas teams. He’s responsible for the areas of measurement, revitalization, replenishment, maintenance and rehabilitation as the Director of Sports Science and Head Athletic Trainer. Upon joining FC Dallas, Richards fifth was the most successful season FC Dallas has had in their 21-years of existence. His advanced measurement strategies have made a huge impact on the team as they strive to keep the highest player availability in the league. The product of the team’s prevention mechanisms and utilization of the latest technologies to maintain health has resulted in winning the Western Conference and Lamar Hunt US Open Cup. Applying sports science to training helps Richards better inform the team’s decision makers, which ultimately helps the team win. Richards’ passion for leveraging sports science data to ensure player availability stems from his background in injury prevention, evaluation and rehabilitation. <blockquote> “After completing several internships, I realized that our profession was not focused enough on prevention, but was very important in terms of savings and winning. This realization is what propelled me to dive into the sports sciences, specifically in how to increase detection of physiologic breakdown before it affected squad availability,” says Richards. </blockquote> In his quest for a solution in maintaining player availability, Richards discovered Athos. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/fc-dallas/OP_LTL810010.jpg" alt="alt alt alt"> Skylar Richards pictured above training one of FC Dallas' players. <blockquote> “The physiology of professional athletes is too complex for the naked eye to see everything. Athos allows me to not only track how much work they are doing in real-time, but also track the workload of each muscle group to return from injury as fast as possible,” says Richards. </blockquote> <h2 id="return-to-play-with-athos">Return to Play with Athos</h2> When FC Dallas’ impact player needed help from Richards to get back on the field, they worked together to leverage data from the Athos Training System to monitor his progress and form a rehabilitation plan. Richards had the injured athlete use Athos for corrective work throughout generic rehab and field work. To start, they needed to establish a baseline; they did this by looking at left/right balance, as well as contribution from each muscle group. After making those assessments, they determined that the healthy side would be the goal for values to hit. Once that was set, they determined a path for returning to the game. Richards was then able to begin tracking rehabilitation protocols in the gym and movement on the field five days a week, with up to two sessions a day for rehab. <h2 id="balance-insights">Balance Insights</h2> During this process, Richards monitored stress incurred by the muscles to ensure that balance was not impacted by increases in training load. He also worked on ensuring that training load varied throughout the week without increasing unexpectedly as they enhanced his program. A goal for Richards was making sure that progress was made to regain balance between the injured and healthy leg. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/fc-dallas/OP_FCDallas.jpg" alt="alt alt alt"> Online Training Center Training Load chart highlighting balance between left and right legs during lower body movements. <h2 id="muscle-contribution-insights">Muscle Contribution Insights</h2> Richards and team monitored the athlete’s banded monster walks, boss kicks, jump and land, single leg squat and overhead squat. At the set level, Richards checked that the athlete was driving his movements using posterior activation. He did this by focusing on increasing the muscle contribution from the glutes while also making sure his glute activations were balanced. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/fc-dallas/OP_FCDallas2.jpg" alt="alt alt alt"> Online Training Center Training Load chart illustrating muscle breakdown during lower body movements. For the unweighted corrective movements, Richards would base the number of sets around imbalance and using muscle contribution to assess form. When doing this, Richards aimed for the last set to have the best balance and contribution. If this wasn’t achieved, he would add another set and make modifications until progress was made. After each day concluded, Richards would analyze the overall training load. This load included field work that was programmed by another coach to make sure the athletes overall training load was not causing an increase in his imbalance and maintaining posterior heavy movement on the field. <h2 id="redefining-the-edge-">Redefining “The Edge”</h2> Richards had great success using Athos during this athlete's rehabilitation, ultimately getting him back on the field faster. As a Director of Sports Science, Richards knows that a primary function of his job is to leverage data to increase player performance- and Athos gives him that edge. If you're interested in using Athos to empower your athletes check out the <a href="https://www.liveathos.com/product-facility">Athos Training System</a>.

Athos @ the NFL Combine

Dr. Julie K. Desjardins PhD

Every year leading up to the end of February college football players prepare for the NFL combine. The goal is to improve the athlete’s performance in the standard NFL combine tests which include vert height, 40-yard sprint time, 5-10-5 shuttle time and others. Athos partnered with Fast Twitch to help 6 college athletes prepare for the combine using the combination of Fast Twitch’s elite performance training approach and Athos’ performance data. Each athlete used Athos’ compression shorts throughout their program. With Athos the coaches at Fast Twitch were able to measure the activation and workload of the quads, hamstrings and glutes and personalize the programming for each athlete based on how each athlete was leveraging these major muscle groups. Each athlete performed a benchmark at the start of the program to evaluate their performance in each combine test. The athletes were re-tested during the program to monitor progress and tested at the completion of the program. With data on how each athlete used each major muscle group over the course of the program we were able to better understand what correlated with greatest improvement in different combine tests. Athos measures the workload placed on each muscle group by accumulating the intensity of the muscle activation over time. Balance of the athlete can be evaluated by comparing the workload of symmetric muscles on the left and right side. For example, overall lower body left and right balance can be compared by comparing the overall left side workload to the right side workload. Also, the contribution of workload from different muscle groups can be compared as a contribution percentage. For example, the workload contribution of the glutes is just the workload from the glutes compared to the total workload from the glutes, hamstrings and quads. Starting with the vertical jump, it is well known that a strong posterior chain is essential to generate maximum ground force to get the body as high off the ground as possible. This is why the vertical jump height is often used as a measure of lower body strength and the glutes being the largest muscle in the body is an essential component to this overall strength. We looked at the relationship between the % of total workload done by the glutes and the improvement in the athlete’s vert. As seen in the figure below, the athlete’s that had a higher proportion of glute workload throughout the program had the greatest increase in vert height. There was a very strong correlation between the % of glute workload and vert improvement. Coaches can use this information to evaluate the effectiveness of a program at the movement, workout or program level at targeting a specific muscle group. Knowing how important glute workload is to vert improvement coaches can use this information to personalize the programming for each athlete to get to higher contribution that will translate into improved performance. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-09-01%20at%201.30.28%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> We also found that the athletes who demonstrated worse balance between their left and right side over the program had lower vert improvement. Again, coaches can monitor the imbalance each athlete is demonstrating to adjust the programming for specific athletes to ensure their overall program is promoting balanced training on each side of the body which was shown to result in improved performance. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-09-01%20at%201.30.14%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> On to the 40-yard start. The hamstrings are an essential muscle group to helping the athlete get off the line as fast as possible and generate explosive ground force to translate into higher acceleration. The figure below demonstrates that the athletes who had a higher overall workload contribution from the hamstrings during the program had a greater improvement in their 40-yard time. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-09-01%20at%201.29.52%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> Coaches can use workload per muscle to understand how their programming is stressing different muscle groups of a given athlete and to understand how higher stress on one muscle group compared to another can translate into performance improvement in different combine tests. The coach can use this information to target specific combine test weaknesses of a given athlete and use the information as a tool in the coach’s arsenal to dial in the performance for a specific athlete. If you're interested in using Athos to empower your athletes check out the <a href="https://www.liveathos.com/product-facility">Athos Training System</a>.

Return to Play with Athos

Kristen Larsen, Applied Sports Scientist

It’s nearing the end of regular season and one of your best players is fresh off an injury. He assures you that with one game off, he can be back to finish out the season with the team. You are torn; thinking about the risk for reinjury versus making the playoffs. Will he be sitting on sidelines or able to contribute to your success? How do you have confidence in this decision thinking about his future career, the team’s win record, and your reputation as a tactful coach? A lot is on the line. You ping-pong between “Do No Harm” and “I am ready, Coach”, wishing you had more information to make the right decision. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/2CB_12_12_16_Athos_Miami_378-copy.jpg" alt="alt alt alt"> Deciding when an athlete is ready to return to the field is complex and difficult and an exercise in risk management. While athletes and coaches may be thinking they are ready to return, reinjury rates are staggering. Athletes suffering an ACL tear (that requires surgery) are 6 times more likely to get injured again within 2 years than their healthy counterparts. This reinjury rate is directly related to the load placed upon the injured muscle (image below: Gabbett, 2016). <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-09-01%20at%201.37.36%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> Traditionally, coaches and athletes have relied upon intuition, general recovery rates and sparse data to make their return to play decisions. Muscle activity based training load gets your injured players back in the game faster With compression gear embedded with biosensors, Athos has developed a system that will allow you to put confidence back in your return to play decisions. This practical tool can help facilitate glute activation, quantify specific muscle activity and training load to ensure the best exercises are implemented, high volume training is monitored and post-injury compensation patterns are reduced. Athos can be used to support return to play decisions through the following: <ul> <li>Creating baselines: Find baseline muscle contributions and balance for healthy and injured sides</li> <li>Real-time Biofeedback: Use visual feedback during corrective exercises. Athlete looks for glute activation in real-time to promote the neuromuscular connection and reinforce recruitment of the glute.</li> <li>Movement Memory: When visual biofeedback is removed, does muscle activation stay from corrective movements through dynamic movements?</li> <li>Balance: See if asymmetries exist with particular movement and track how balance if affected by volume changes after injury. </li> <li>Training Load: Ensure that the healing tissue is not being over or under stressed to validate that your rehab and progression plan is ideal for each individual athlete. </li> </ul> Gabbett, TJ. 2016. The training-injury prevention paradox: should athletes be training smarter and harder? British Journal of Sports Medicine. doi: 10.1136/bjsports-2015-095788.

Athos Measures Muscle Specific Training Load

Chris Wiebe

Many coaches and sports organizations are taking a scientific approach to both designing programs and monitoring athlete performance. What they have discovered is that monitoring training load can help determine whether an athlete is adapting to a training program and can help minimize the risk of non-impact soft tissue injury. The relationship between the performance of an athlete and the load they have experienced is represented by the figure below. One factor that influences the ability for the athlete to achieve a given out for a given physiological load is fatigue. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-09-01%20at%201.05.16%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> It can be difficult to compare the stress and load placed on an athlete based on performance output metrics alone such as distance or accumulated acceleration. Different athletes will respond differently to a given distance or total acceleration based on their strengths, technique and efficiency. Athos has developed garments with distributed sensors that measure the activation of specific muscles throughout the upper and lower body. We use the accumulation of this activation to determine training load. Training load is a direct proxy of the accumulated stress or internal load placed on the muscle and this is highly correlated with the output force. To demonstrate how Athos is used to measure the stress placed on the body and how this changes with fatigue, we exposed athletes two identical exercises under to conditions of fatigue: totally rested and fatigued. We measured Athos muscle activity as well as the torque and force generated by the athlete. What we found was that higher EMG activation was required to complete the exercise at a higher level of fatigue. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-09-01%20at%201.10.06%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> Athletes need to increase activation when fatigued and this translated into a higher demand placed on the athlete. This tells us that the Athos training load represents the physiological demand placed on specific muscle groups of the athlete. Coaches can use this information to understand how their programming is affecting their athletes and how the programming can be personalized to achieve specific performance goals. If you're interested in using Athos to empower your athletes check out the <a href="https://www.liveathos.com/product-facility">Athos Training System</a>.

Unlocking the key to the perfect squat

Chris Wiebe

At Athos, we’re always striving to gain deeper insights into the human body. To do that Athos partnered with ProActive, an elite sports performance institute that trains some of the top athletes in the world. We threw the gear on seven NFL athletes to capture their last two sessions of offseason training. It was awesome to watch world class athletes like Clay Matthews, Taylor Mays, Lamarr Houston, Jonathan Stewart, and Malik Jackson in our gear. It was also great to take a step back and watch the trainers at ProActive take over using the real time feedback to adjust the athlete’s position and form. It was all about getting the intensity ratios dialed in across the lower body muscle groups: quads, hamstrings and glutes. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-09-01%20at%201.24.10%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> Friendly Competition One of the drills involved trying to do as many body weight squats as possible within 45 seconds, making sure to get down to a proper 90 degrees at the knee. We saw a fun competition between two of the NFL players. We’ll call them Player A and Player B. Player B got to 30 and Player A hit 54! (almost 2x) What happened? Now normally this is where Player B would just go train more and hope to beat Player A next time. But because they were both wearing Athos gear, we’re able to compare the breakdown of load per muscle as a percentage of total capacity. At 21% and 26% muscle effort on his right and left glute, Player A was able to better leverage his glutes vs. Player B at 7% and 9%. <img src="https://athos-website.global.ssl.fastly.net/v2/content/o/Screen%20Shot%202017-09-01%20at%201.24.26%20PM.png" alt="alt alt alt"> By spreading more of the load onto his glutes and hamstrings Player A was able to take some of the burden off his quads resulting in a more efficient squat. He was able to sustain a higher cadence and ultimately achieve more reps. Now Player B knows what he needs to do to beat Player A next time. (I gave it a go too, but I’d prefer not to disclose my numbers!) We’re looking forward to further collaborations and insights to push the limits and help everyone train more effectively. Stay tuned for more updates from us. Now go do some squats with Athos! If you're interested in using Athos to empower your athletes check out the <a href="https://www.liveathos.com/product-facility">Athos Training System</a>.