The Real Science of Sport Podcast

By Professor Ross Tucker and Mike Finch

World-renowned sports scientist Professor Ross Tucker and veteran sports journalist Mike Finch break down the myths, practices and controversies from the world of sport. From athletics to rugby, socce... more

· Sports

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The podcast currently has 353 episodes available.

Best of The Real Science of Sport Podcast

The most played episodes among Podcast App listeners.

Number 1: The Science-Backed Truth About Peptides
Everywhere you look people are talking about peptides. But what exactly are they, how do they work and how safe are they for human consumption? Mike and Ross review the evidence, discuss the politics that continue to muddy the waters around peptide efficacy and regulation, and examine the dangers of using untested peptides. The team also look into the role of the popular GLP-1's that have revolutionised diabetes and weight loss and the controversial BPC-17 peptide, touted as a miracle treatment for tissue repair. Links The Undark article that describes the history of BPC157 More on the FDA and the complex regulation of peptides A report on one of the FDA decisions about peptides - in this case BPC157 and KPV A paper from the discoverer of BPC157, who has published more than three-quarters of the research on it The human safety study on BPC157, with its two participants Systematic review of BPC157 evidence, suggesting promise but caution A well researched article by Dr Eric Topol raising concerns about safety and regulatory decisions Example of a public warning from a regulatory body, this one from South Africa Follow the money - Fortune 500 piece on why deregulation could create a multibillion dollar market Become a Supporter of The Science of Sport for about the price of a coffee, or a gel, and help us keep the lights on, and Gareth's candle burning! Plus, you'll get ad free listening, a weekly Applied show, and a community that argues better than the internet does! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
August 17, 20261h 21min
Number 2: How can a 10,000m Runner Outsprint an 800m Runner? / Werro tops Hodgkinson, Again / Ansah's Missed Doping Test / Swimming World Record Watch
Not yet a member? Ad-free listening, the Discourse community, and a members' show every week, all for less than you spend on gels. Show notes On the show this week, a European Championships wrap featuring Nadia Battocletti's astonishing 10,000m finish and Audrey Werro's win over Keely Hodgkinson, a German sprinter under a doping cloud, world records in the pool, and a follow-up on peptides. (00:01:41) A follow-up to the peptides show with Mike, and the thing Ross wishes he had said. The anecdote that BPC-157 failed to fix someone's Achilles is the human version of publication bias, because nobody ever tells you about the thing that didn't work.(00:12:23) The European Championships format and the broadcast, which featured more talking heads than athletics on the BBC, and an athletic programme with far too little action relative to downtime.(00:16:52) The women's 800m, where Werro beat Hodgkinson for her fourth sub-1:55 of the year, and Bol ran a national record in third. Whose trajectory looks best in the medium to long-term?(00:28:26) Batocletti's exceptional sprint finish, and a Tim Noakes tweet asking why she could speed up at all. Ross explains the end spurt, the reserve we all hold back, and why this particular race proves rather less than it appears to.(00:31:52) A stat from Jason Henderson: Batocletti's last 200m was 28.17, Werro's in the 800m was 29.11. Not a typo, and we explain why the fatigue of an 800m is a completely different animal, and speculate that it's probably more common than you'd think for the 10000m races to finish faster than the 800m ones(00:34:37) Andreas Almgren's solo 10,000m, run at 26:43 pace for the final 8.8km. Tactical optimization and a signal for a sub 26:30 in the future?(00:40:22) Amy Hunt's four golds, and a newspaper headline that poured cold water on them.(00:43:42) Owen Ansah wins European gold under a doping cloud, having refused a test because he had a flight to catch. What counts as "compelling justification", and why a 2016 case suggests he is in trouble.(00:52:26) The tragic death of Fin Tarling, the near-impossibility of policing a 1,300km course, and Adam Hansen's call for better helmets, which are certified only to 19.5km/h.(00:59:47) Swimming, where Kate Douglass broke the 50m freestyle world record twice in a day, a 19-year-old German went under 14:30 for the 1500m free, and Lani Pallister beat Katie Ledecky over 800m for the first time.(01:10:46) And finally, South Africa versus New Zealand has branded itself "Rugby's Greatest Rivalry". Gareth is not buying it. Ross offers the context for why it's about more than rugby, but also great rugby No news show next week, but there's an interview show planned for Monday, and the members' Applied show will take overtraining next week Friday. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
August 19, 20261h 18min
Number 3: Inside The World of Sports Broadcasting
Briton Tony Davies has pretty much seen it all when it comes to television sport broadcasting. With over 20 years' experience in broadcast TV as a director, producer and writer, Davies has made a number of documentaries, including the RTS-nominated A Bat and Ball War, and worked on numerous sports events including the FIFA World Cup, Rugby World Cup, Olympic Games, Paralympics, Asian Games, Wimbledon, Open Championship and Tour de France. His broadcast experience opened the door to event management roles, and Davies has worked as Broadcast Venue Manager on the past three Rugby World Cups. He was also the Broadcast Project Manager for the Special Olympics in 2019. During his early years, he worked on the legendary sports magazine show, Trans World Sport and his interviewed some of the biggest names in world sport, including Mike Tyson, Muhammad Ali, Maradona, Pele, a 13-year-old Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus, Wayne Gretzky, Kip Keino and even Whitney Houston and John Candy. In this episode we talk about how commentators are chosen, the economics of sports broadcasting, how modern technology is changing how we watch sports and what the future holds in the digital age for viewers. Davies lives in Nelson, New Zealand, where he lives with his wife and six (yes, it's not a typo !) children. He enjoys a number of sports including cycling, running, boxing, hunting, fishing and paddling. He is a frequent visitor to the UK, where he still has a base, and to Asia, where he does production work for the BBC. Also, for our Real Science of Sport Members, stick around after the show for some bonus content as we continued our chat with Tony and got even more fascinating insights, including his thoughts on social media influencers as broadcast 'partners', why he doesn't buy into the 'all access' documentaries so frequently made about sports events, and his choice of best documentary ever made. If you're not a member, a small monthly donation gets you that bonus content, ad-free listening, exclusive shows and membership of our Discourse community, of which Tony is a member too! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
August 24, 20261h 34min
Number 4: FEATURE: How To Beat the Heat
Ross Hemingway, OBE, is a Sport & Exercise Medicine Practitioner at the Commando Training Centre for the Royal Marines. His clinical expertise centres on exertional collapse, in particular the prevention, acute management, and rehabilitation of exertional heat illness (EHI) in elite, amateur, and tactical athletes, and is recognised as a UK national expert in this field. Hemingway is also a member of the UK Heat Illness Advisory Group and a contributing author to the Faculty of Pre-Hospital Care’s (FPHC) UK consensus statement on the management of Exertional Heat Illness. In this interview, Hemingway breaks down the theory of heat illness, how it happens, prevalence, and the best ways of dealing with EHI during exercise. Alongside his clinical practice, he is also the founder of Nereus Medical Ltd and inventor of the patented I-CWIK, a lightweight, robust and clinically proven system developed to provide effective cold-water immersion of heat stroke casualties in the pre-hospital and hospital environment. Become a Supporter of The Real Science of Sport, and for the price of a coffee, or a gel, you get a bonus Applied episode every week, ad-free shows, and the best cycling and running community going over on Discourse. SHOW NOTES The EHI Consensus Statement website The Full EHI Article, of which Ross is lead author One of the studies Ross alluded to, this one from the World Champs in Doha Another paper he mentioned, discussing athlete management ahead of the Olympic Games The baboon model for heatstroke discussed on the show We published a study years back documenting some heatstrokes in SA endurance events Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
August 03, 20261h 46min
Number 5: Kasia Niewiadoma's Mont Ventoux Masterclass / The Physiology of Losing a Yellow Jersey / A Doping Ban That Fits a Familiar Pattern
Become a Supporter of The Science of Sport for about the price of a coffee, or a gel, and help us keep the lights on, and Gareth's candle burning! Plus, you'll get ad free listening, a weekly Applied show, and a community that argues better than the internet does! Show notes On the show today, the physiology behind the best women's Grand Tour we can remember, and a doping ban that fits a pattern we have seen many times before. (00:01:00) The Tour de France Femmes was, we think, the best Grand Tour either of us has watched in years, and we explore the nine stages of unpredictable racing that had us intrigued, even if the record will show that Demi Vollering won four of them.(00:05:56) Kasia Niewiadoma's ride on Mont Ventoux, at somewhere between 5.3 and 5.6 W/kg for the climb, is arguably the greatest climbing performance in the history of women's cycling, and we place it against the published power duration curves to show just how far outside the 90th percentile it sits.(00:17:19) Niewiadoma also posted 9.9 W/kg for 86 seconds, and from that single Strava screenshot we work out her FTP and her W', the anaerobic "battery", which lets us answer the question everyone argued about, namely whether being blocked into that corner actually cost her time to rival Vollering. We think the answer is unequivocally yes, and the maths and the principle of pacing explains why.(00:25:50) Praise for Puck Pieterse, sympathy for Marlen Reusser and Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, and a wonder about the 'mature' podium, and the prospect of a handover to the next generation in good time, just not 'our time'(00:41:41) The World U20 Championships, where a 17 year old ran 7:28 solo for 3000m, Tate Taylor doubled up in 9.94 and 19.83, and the ever-turning carousel of youth talent that is sometimes derailed by injury and sometimes deposed by the next young phenom(00:45:46) Jakob Ingebrigtsen returns and wins the European 5000m title in 13:16, off a slow race that played into his hands, and he explains, correctly, that a 5000m is not a test of speed but of how much speed you have left. He also promises he'll be "astonishingly a lot better" next time.(00:52:32) Jonah Koech gets a three year ban after an adverse passport finding. We explain how the biological passport actually works, why two suspicious samples means the values must have been wildly out of the norm, and why his 3.2% improvement should have invited scepticism long before the blood results did. Performance is not proof, but pattern recognition lives on, with this its latest illustration.(01:07:46) The WNBA has no eligibility policy, so two former NBA players have declared for the women's draft to prove the point. We discuss why choosing not to decide is itself a decision, how people are choosing to pretend a problem doesn't exist (or that it doesn't matter if it does), and contrast this with the WTA who have implemented screening for eligibility, and just gotten on with it(01:15:29) And finally, the origins of the steeplechase, which begins with two blokes, an Irish pub, a wager, and two church steeples. Plus a nutritionist on social media who watched 96 seconds and decided we had lost all credibility. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
August 12, 20261h 24min