Edge of Sound / Edge of Silence
High performing athletes and noise introduction
It is interesting to watch the number of athletes who engage with spectators or other distractions during competitive situations. For every negative interaction there are also moments in the flow of the game where athletes seem almost invigorated by the music or sounds coming from the stadium or playing venue. How can we tell the difference and what is the relationship between the two?
At Seattle Seahawks home games the irreplaceable ‘12th man’ is the large fan base that creates thunderous applause and cheering. The ‘12th man’ is so loud that it has been measured at 137.6 decibels or roughly equivalent to a jet airplane. Is there a 12th man advantage and a relationship between sound and scoring drive effectiveness or winning percentage? The data is difficult to parse but what we do know is that teams visiting Seattle suffer from the highest percentage of false starts. We don’t want to go too far down the path of causality but there does appear on the surface a link between sound and performance. Certainly in this instance there is a link between the high decibels of sound and opposing team performance.
But what about lower decibel sound?
Interestingly enough we have a large sample of data to better understand the impact of sound and how to convert sound into edge and flow training schemas. We have this data because much of professional sports in 2020 was played in front of an artificial (not physically in the venue). Most of what we believe is that home field advantage and noise produce optimal conditions for wins. The data might tell us otherwise at least in certain respects and it is important to understand them in order to introduce the correct situations into your training and consulting.
In a smallish sample just under 1500 rounds of golf over the course of 2020 where tournaments were played with no fans golf scores dropped by between 1-2 strokes. The data is imperfect as we are unable to measure and control for weather, rest, average handicap, etc. but what we do see across a variety of sports is that sound and energy from fans most likely does not change the performance of the athlete.
Where does this leave us? We postulate that high performance athletes have been preparing for fanless/noiseless performance for some time now. We also know that the artificial sounds that are being pumped into playing venues have a controlled decibel level. For Edge Flow we have uncovered new and exciting training opportunities for you to use. These techniques are offered under our subscription plan that will allow you to train your athletes on the edge and flow for noise.