Professor welcomes international delegates as ECSS President

LJMU’s Professor of Exercise Physiology is also the incumbent President of the European College of Sport Science, and recently welcomed around 2,800 delegates from across the globe to the annual congress, this year held in Vienna.

The European College of Sport Science (ECSS) is the largest sports science organisation in the world and Professor Tim Cable of the School of Sport and Exercise Science is its President for the next two years. The ECSS exists to disseminate the highest quality science by hosting an annual congress in a different European city each year, and also aims to showcase and empower the work of young scientists by running a series of Young Investigator awards.

The annual congress in Vienna received over 1,900 abstract submissions, and delegates attended from 66 countries around the world.  Across the four days of the meeting, four plenaries, 36 invited symposia and 320 oral and poster sessions were delivered in subject areas spanning the multidisciplinary areas of Sport and Exercise Sciences.

LJMU highlights were the award of Young Investigator prizes to two postgraduate students, Kelly Hammond and Francesca Champ.  Kelly won a prize sponsored by the Gatorade Sports Science Institute, with Francesca receiving an award for excellence in football research, sponsored by Aspetar Sports Medicine Hospital. Professor Graeme Close and Dr James Morton from LJMU’s School of Sport and Exercise Science also delivered presentations on their applied work in rugby and cycling.

The ECSS annual congress now moves on to Germany in 2017 and in 2018 will be held in Dublin. Professor Cable commented: “The ECSS Congress is a fantastic event that has grown since the very first congress in Nice in 1996. It showcases the very best science from around the world and encourages young people working in our discipline to find solutions to real world issues affecting society today.”