Beginning Of Competition Research Articles

Swimming performance, physiology, and post-activation performance enhancement following dryland transition phase warmup: A systematic review.

BackgroundIn swimming, the period between the end of the swimming warmup and the beginning of competition is critical to performance, here termed the transition phase. Several options are available during this phase, necessitating a systematic review to understand if optimal strategies exist.ObjectivesTo synthesise and critically evaluate the current literature investigating land-based warmup interventions on subsequent performance in competitive swimmers.MethodsA search of three electronic databases (PubMed, EBSCO SPORTDiscus and Web of Science) was conducted to identify original studies until February 2022. Selection criteria dictated that (i) a control condition was used, (ii) participants were ≥ 15 years of age, (iii) a pool-based warmup was done prior to the land-based warmup. A total of 25 articles met the selection criteria.ResultsReducing the transition phase duration by at least half led to consistently faster time-trial times of between 1.1–1.5% for all included studies. Passive warmups using clothing interventions resulted in mostly faster time-trial’s of 0.4–0.8% with increases in skin temperature frequent, though little change occurred in core temperature. The methodology of passive respiratory warmups were vastly different with positive time-trial’s effects ranging between 0.9–1.1% for two studies, though one reported no meaningful difference. Active warmups led to consistently faster time-trial’s between 0.7–0.9%, though the unpinning factors are not clear. Warmups which combined passive and active options frequently led to faster time-trial’s between 0.8–3%. Upper and combined limb post-activation performance enhancement led to mostly unfavourable time-trial changes. Lower limb exclusive protocols results were inconsistent, with limited beneficial effects on time-trial or start performance reported following plyometric protocols. However, there does appear merit in heavier loaded lower limb protocols.ConclusionEach of a reduced transition phase length, and passive, active or combination warmup have demonstrated improvements in swimming performance. Conversely, PAPE protocols should be used with caution, especially when including the upper limbs.

Los concursos televisivos como estrategia de programación en España (1990-2010): :

Los años noventa representaron un cambio decisivo en la televisión española. La llegada de los canales privados trajo consigo la ruptura del monopolio que había representado la televisión pública y el comienzo de la competencia entre los canales generalistas públicos y privados. En este interés por atraer al espectador y a la inversión publicitaria, el entretenimiento será un factor clave, concretándose en la producción de formatos concurso. Mediante una metodología cualitativa de análisis de contenidos analizaremos el comportamiento de los programas concurso desde 1990 hasta 2010 y comprobaremos cómo su presencia no solo es continua en las parrillas de programación, si no que el género se adapta en función de las necesidades de programación y de las audiencias.

Understanding the Foundations of Fighting and Winning a Price War in the Digital Age

For decades with the beginning of competition, many organisations compete on the basis of low prices. Price wars, however, represent a fundamentally different dynamic than simply trying to get an edge on price. They begin when competitors aggressively and repeatedly set prices below established sustainable levels. In some cases, organisations that initiate price wars engage in self-destructive behaviour, which leads to downward pricing spirals that alter industry structures. In theory, there are no winners in price wars: The losers of these brutal competitions are often forced out of business, and the survivors have been known to suffer a long-term squeeze in profitability. Research suggest that in price wars that took place between 1980 and 2013 in industries including airlines, telecoms and financial services, price wars were invariably linked with serious drops in financial performance. Indeed, when price wars erupted, most companies found themselves in commodity traps: Profits narrowed considerably, and weak competitors had difficulty staying in business. The common view in economics and strategy is that a company’s ability to win a price war hinges on having a superior cost structure. However, research demonstrates that this is not the only way to gain the upper hand. Contrary to most studies, under the right circumstances, it’s possible for a company to win a price war by leveraging a specific set of strategic capabilities. Specifically, these include the ability to read the business context and how things are changing, the skills to analyze the market data to identify trends and opportunities, and the pragmatic wherewithal to implement organizational changes both internally and across the value chain. In short, recent research showed that winning a price war can have as much to do with a company’s strategic capabilities and skills as its relative cost position. This new move provokes new thinking on how companies can influence price war outcomes, suggesting that other companies might be able to achieve success by establishing five rules of engagement. The rules will help managers frame the contextual, analytical and pragmatic capabilities by helping them 1) affirm the need, 2) pick the battlefield, 3) pick the target, 4) stay under the radar and 5) align revenues with cost structures and rally support needed to succeed. This paper discusses the foundations of fighting and winning a price war.

Limits to Change

AbstractProduction studies have become popular over the past decade. Recent studies have analysed, amongst other things, innovation, management strategies and the effects of convergence on editorial processes. There have only been a few studies that have analysed what happened inside media organisations in the earlier transformative stages (outside the UK and the USA). This paper analyses how the Norwegian public service broadcaster (NRK) adapted to the loss of its monopoly and the beginning of competition during the mid-1980s. It provides a window into how the flagship of public service, the Enlightenment Department, dealt with the new situation.If one follows the production process of the main programme of the department (with the revealing working title ‘Flagship’) from its conception to its realisation as a weekly programme broadcast in prime time, this reveals how innovation at the time was restricted by organisational arrangements, internal values and external pressures. The programme makers included many elements that are still today considered to be advantageous in factual programming (humour, dramatization, popularisation, serialization, recognition, and even interactivity). Along the way several of these were changed: what had started as a proposal for a documentary series turned into something that was predominantly a discussion programme.

Study of specificities of arm wrestlers’ psychological status in competition period

Purpose: researching and analysis of psychological status dynamic of different qualification arm-wrestlers in competitions’ condition. Material: in the research 21 students-sportsmen of 17-24 years’ age participated. Results: before the beginning of competition experienced sportsmen are characterized by higher workability in comparison with beginners - (56.61±8.31) % against (23.23±11.93) %. After competitions among experienced sportsmen 57.14% had reduced anxiety; 71.43% - reduced activity and self-feeling; 50% - had worse mood. After competitions among sportsmen-beginners 73.73% demonstrated reduction of workability; 54.54% had weakened activity, mood and self-feeling. We established significant prevalence of statistically confident correlations among experienced sportsmen: 65.15% against 46.97%. Contribution of psychological components in system of sportsmen-beginners is significantly lower than of experienced sportsmen. Conclusions: we determined certain changes of psychological status of arm-wrestlers of different qualification under influence of competitions. For experienced sportsmen we confirmed more optimal status and favorable dynamic, illustrating high reliability of functioning.

Asymmetric information, foreign entry and multi-period credit competition in banking industry

In a credit market, a low-cost foreign entrant is likely less informed than a domestic bank with information endowments. We present a steady-state model in an infinite-period framework, and analyze how the informational asymmetry affects the lending equilibrium and the foreign banks’ entry modes. Firstly, we show that the domestic bank's initial informational advantage from its relatively large market share at the beginning of competition is not enough to hinder the entry of a low-cost foreign bank. In addition, the foreign bank is more likely to be the winner in the steady state of an infinite-period game than that in a static game. Secondly, the comparative static analysis show that the likelihood of foreign bank becoming the winning party increases with borrower quality, project payoff and the growth rate of potential new borrowers. Thirdly, when the foreign bank wins game in the steady state, its market share is decreasing in project payoff and the growth rate of new borrowers, while changes non-monotonically with borrower quality. Finally, we extend our model to characterize the domestic bank's sustainable advantage in being relatively familiar with new market, and provide valuable explanations for the observed entry modes of foreign banks in China.

Sequential market entries and competition modelling in multi-innovation diffusions

The diffusion of innovations for simultaneous processes cannot take into account and properly explain systematic perturbations due to competition-substitution effects if they are examined one by one. A first aspect in simultaneous competing diffusions is the distinction between simultaneous market entries ( synchronic competition) and sequential entries ( diachronic competition). In the latter case, the beginning of competition may upset the first entrant’s diffusion. A second important aspect in multiple competition is represented by the choice to model the word-of-mouth effect either at the category level ( balanced model) or at the brand level, separating the within-brand effect from the cross-brand one ( unbalanced model). In this paper, balanced models are studied, and we propose a model that allows for a change in the parameter values of the first entrant as soon as the second one enters the market. The resulting differential system has a closed-form solution that enables, through sales data, an empirical validation of the assumptions underlying the model structure, improving the forecasting accuracy. An application to pharmaceutical drug competition is discussed.

Precompetition Warm-up in Elite and Subelite Rhythmic Gymnastics

The aim of this study was to investigate which precompetition warm-up methodologies resulted in the best overall performance in rhythmic gymnastics. The coaches of national and international clubs (60 elite and 90 subelite) were interviewed. The relationship between sport performance and precompetition warm-up routines was examined. A total of 49% of the coaches interviewed spent more than 1 hour to prepare their athletes for the competition, including 45 minutes dedicated to warm-up exercises. In spite of previous studies' suggestions, the time between the end of warm-up and the beginning of competition was more than 5 minutes for 68% of those interviewed. A slow run was the activity of choice used to begin the warm-up (96%). Significant differences between elite and subelite gymnasts were found concerning the total duration of warm-up, duration of slow running, utilization of rhythmic steps and leaps during the warm-up, the use of dynamic flexibility exercises, competition performances repetition (p < 0.01), and utilization of imagery (p < 0.05). A precompetition warm-up in rhythmic gymnastics would include static stretching exercises at least 60 minutes prior to the competition starting time and the active stretching exercises alternated with analytic muscle strengthening aimed at increasing muscle temperature. Rhythmic gymnastics coaches at all levels can use this data as a review of precompetition warm-up practices and a possible source of new ideas.

The role of DHEA-S in the mood adjustment against negative competition outcome in golfers

Several lines of evidence suggest that dehydroepiandrosterone sulphate (DHEA-S) is invariably consumed following different types of acute stress, implicating its role in stress coping and recovery. The role of DHEA-S in the mood adjustment against negative outcome for athletic competition has not previously been investigated. In the current study, 14 elite golfers participating in a major national golf tournament were subsequently divided into two groups according to their competition outcomes: made the cut (n = 8) and failed to make the cut (n = 8). The Profile of Mood States (POMS) inventory and plasma concentrations of DHEA-S and cortisol were measured 1 day before the beginning of competition (baseline) and 1, 3, and 5 days after the players' final competition, in the morning (08.00–08.30 h) under fasted conditions. Results showed that the total mood disturbance scores and DHEA-S were not changed for the group that made the cut throughout the entire observation period. DHEA-S concentration for the group that failed to make the cut fell significantly below baseline values on day 1 and remained lower for 5 days. The Depression subscale of the POMS for the group that failed to make the cut was increased only on day 1 post-competition, reflecting a situational reaction to the event. Cortisol concentration for the group that made the cut fell significantly below baseline values on day 1 only after competition and no change was observed for the group that failed to make the cut. In conclusion, although the overall mood state post-competition was well-maintained for those golfers who had a negative competition outcome, plasma DHEA-S concentration was reduced for 5 days, suggesting that it has a role in the coping mechanism against psychological challenge.

The effect of radiation-induced mutations on the fitness of Drosophila populations.

The change in frequencies of D. melanogaster and D. simulans in competition experiments was used to measure the effect of radiation on the fitness of a population. A dose of 250 or 500 rads given to the males of highly inbred lines of D. simulans at the beginning of competition and every three weeks thereafter increased the relative frequency of the irradiated population. If the dose was increased to 1000 rads, the deleterious effects of radiation became too great a burden on the population, and the frequency of the irradiated population decreased. From these results it was concluded that below certain doses the introduction of radiation-induced mutations into a highly homozygous population would increase the fitness of the population.