Creating the Ultimate Athlete

High Performance Managers & Strength and Conditioning Coaches to receive immediate benefit from up-to- the-minute sports science from Sport Knowledge Australia

By Imago Group
Monday 25 September, 2006

SYDNEY – Leading practitioners from professional and Olympic sports will join internationally acclaimed sports scientists in presenting a new Sport Knowledge Australia (SKA) course designed to deliver up-to-the-minute research on optimising physical performance at Sydney Olympic Park,
15-16 November.

Over the two-day, live-in course, those who are charged with nurturing elite athletes will learn how to progress their fitness programmes to the ultimate level drawing upon new scientific research and studying its practical application.

Professor Kevin Norton, SKA’s Director of Research and Knowledge Services, promises an intensive two days of learning: "Participants will be brought up to date with the very latest practices in the development of High Performance Sport," he said.

"The focus of this programme will be on applying sport science to enhance performance, with particular emphasis on physical conditioning."

Norton has a high level of expertise in seeing developments in science promoted onto the field of endeavour, with senior coaches in Australian Rules Football and Rugby Union having sought Norton’s expertise in designing their elite training programmes based on quantitative measures of performance intensity during both competition and training.

Norton will be joined by leading researchers and industry representatives including Anthony Crea from Sydney FC. Crea spent two years in England in the lead up to Australia’s Football World Cup campaign supervising training and rehabilitation programmes for Australia’s European based players. The Socceroos radical pre-cup preparation regime will be analysed with course participants to learn lessons through an interactive case-study based approach.

Dr Helen O'Connor, an expert sports dietician from the University of Sydney, will present on best practice in the nutritional preparation of athletes for training and playing. She too has vast experience of working with athletes through associations with the Sydney Swans and Canterbury Bulldogs, as well as organising nutritional programmes for the Sydney Olympic athlete's village.

From Rugby League's South Sydney Rabbitohs, Shaun McRae is ideally suited to offering an insight into the role of conditioning staff within an overall coaching framework. He has filled senior coaching roles in Australia and the UK and prior to that worked as a strength and conditioning manager for the Canberra Raiders for more than a decade.

Full course details click here

ABOUT SKA: Launched in June 2005 with a Federal Government grant of $8.6 million, SKA is jointly owned by the University of Sydney, University of Technology, Sydney and the Sydney Olympic Park Authority. SKA delivers executive level education and knowledge-sharing on sports management, coaching and science via educational programmes, commissioned studies and research within Australia and through partnership programmes overseas. SKA will assist the continued global growth of the sports industry, helping more communities around the world to benefit from Australia's strong sporting culture. Since its launch, SKA has delivered the prestigious Indian School of Business’s first sport product in Hyderabad, run seminars in China on sport venue management and courses in Australia on player valuation strategies, genetic doping in sport, player welfare, executive sport management, elite sport coaching, major event management and facility management.


ATTENTION EDITORS AND PRODUCERS: Professor Kevin Norton is available for interview by contacting – Liz Herbert - Mobile: 0407 234 221 / Tel: +61 2 9664 1410