Did you watch the Olympics and see that strange tape on Kerri Walsh’s shoulder? That tape had a lot of people, including myself, wondering what it was. It turns out it’s called Kinesio taping and the science behind it is very interesting.

This tape actually increases blood flow to the injured area instead of obstructing it like traditional taping does. The tape works by lifting the skin so that more blood flow goes to the injured area which reduces pain and speeds up recovery time.

The tape is water resistant and each application can be left on for three to five days. The tape comes in black, beige, pink and blue. It’s also 100% cotton and latex free.

This new science is changing the way that injuries are being treated. Kinesio tape provides just as much stabilization as the Norman athletic tape but doesn’t increase pain.

This practice is now used by most NBA teams and quickly moving into NFL and other sports such as beach volleyball. A great thing about the tape is that it’s not expensive and there are cheap books that explain how to apply the tape on each part of the body. You don’t need to be an athletic trainer to buy Kinesio tape and use it on the part of your body that is injured. You can also use it on areas that you don’t want to injure because it adds extra support. It is now available online and is getting great reviews from all that have used it.

Gold in volleyball, silver in basket, gold in formula one, silver in tennis, hockey, etc, etc. The Spanish sport medals add up to an amazing collection year in year out.
Except for soccer. The soccer medals if there would be any has never been more than bronze. Quarterfinals is the best the Spanish soccer team ever got to.

And this is strange — call it a paradox — if you know how many children (and parents) support the soccer game. Soccer is by far the most popular sport in Spain. The sport is practiced in every single town and there is always enough supply to source whatever team in whatever league / age-category.

This is quite different from basket, volleyball hockey or handball. It is a sheer impossible task to find enough children for many of the age categories to start a league. Volleyball is even hard to find at all in the South of Spain, except for beach-volleyball.

The problem starts at the schools. Sport is often not part of physical education which is merely dedicated to gym. There is nearly no team sport promoted on schools. After school programs however do dedicate time to sports, but not in the context of a club and without the possibilities of competing in leagues.

There are initiatives to change this and this change is needed. Diversity is a welcome driver for innovation.
Besides it would make the most popular sport (soccer) less stressful for children. The first leagues start for eight-year-olds and the selection process seems as important as for the adult leagues. Parents (especially fathers) are so keen on their kid to become a professional player that selections to enter the league become an important ritual.

And only few will really excel. Many of those nine year olds will end somewhere in the middle. A More diverse supply of different team-sports would be a healthy improvement. And diminishing the stress to perform well in soccer may influence the results in a positive way. Gold in Spanish soccer, it’s possible.

? 2007 Hans Bool

Beijing Olympics A Moment In History

The Beijing Olympics will take place August 8-24, 2008, in Beijing, China. During this time the Olympic sport list consists of 28 summer sports. There are also roughly 10,500 athletes that are projected to partake in the Games, with around 20,000 credited media bringing the Olympics to the world.

Here is the Olympic Sport List:

Archery
Athletics
Badminton
Baseball
Basketball
Beach Volleyball
Boxing
Canoe/Kayak Flatwater
Canoe/Kayak Slalom
Cycling BMX
Cycling Mountain Bike
Cycling Road
Cycling Track
Diving
Equestrian
Fencing
Football
Gymnastics Artistic
Gymnastics Rhythmic
Trampoline
Handball
Hockey
Judo
Modern Pentathlon
Rowing
Sailing
Shooting
Softball
Swimming
Synchronized Swimming
Table Tennis
Tae kwon do
Tennis
Triathlon
Volleyball
Water Polo
Weightlifting
Wrestling

There are 302 different events in these 28 sports. The 2008 Beijing Olympics will mark this the third time that the Olympic events will have been held in the territories of two dissimilar National Olympic Committees. One event will be held in Hong Kong

Athletes from Hong Kong nevertheless are flying the flag of Hong Kong even though Hong Kong is not an independent state.

The opening which occurred on August 8, 2008, all but one (Brunei) of the current 205 National Olympic Committees will take part. China and the United States have the biggest teams, with 639 and 596 competitors in that order. Quite a lot of countries are represented at the games by a single athlete.

Of 195 independent countries, only three did not take part: Brunei, Kosovo and Vatican City. Another three countries participated for their first time in history: The Marshall Islands, Montenegro and Tuvalu.

The agenda for the Beijing 2008 Games is rather like to that of the Athens Games held in 2004. The 2008 Olympics will see the arrival of 28 sports, and will hold 302 events (165 men’s events, 127 women’s events, and 10 mixed events), one event more in total than in Athens.