My first Exercise and Sport Science Australia conference done and dusted! Unfortunately, it had to be hosted online, however the hosting platform was brilliant and it was a great day of Listening, Learning and Asking Questions.
I was fortunate enough to present some of my Ph.D research in the form of a poster. The opportunity lead to some great conversations with Exercise Scientists and Physiologists from around Australia. Some great questions were asked but more importantly I was able to get some crucial feedback from the clinical space on how blood flow restriction is being implemented already across both weight training and aerobic exercise. This feedback should help me shape future research so that, as the title of the conference alludes, I am conducting research that can be put into practice. Thank you to everyone that jumped in on my poster presentation and added to the conversation.
Screen shot of the presentation platform between conversations.
Like all conferences, there is no way that you can watch all the presenters. But the ones that I was able to get to were very engaging. Two things that shood out to me as they are things that I have thought of before and I will always keep them in mind with designing research studies or designing exercising programs.
The first was from Professor Brian Dawson. Giving a large overview on research in AFL over the past few decades he mentioned that elite sport was getting to a point where data is being collected before the research question is being developed. Which I believe could be misleading moving forward as information is somewhat “cherry picked” to answer an individual’s opinion rather than an experimental question.
The second was from Dr Nicky Korman who was speaking in the Exercise and Mental Illness session. Dr Korman spoke about fun, programming for enjoyment and emphasised that if enjoyment/fun is the purpose of a session, exercise benefits could be more consistent over the long term. Thank you Dr Korman for this great insight.
Lastly, thank you to all the organisers for putting on such a great event and sponsors that make it possible.