Conference Speakers

Prof Ron Maughan

Ron Maughan is Professor of Sport and Exercise Nutrition at Loughborough University. He is a Fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine. He chaired the Human and Exercise Physiology group of the Physiological Society for 10 years, and now chairs the Sports Nutrition Working Group of the Medical Commission of the International Olympic Committee. He has worked with many teams and organisations within football and other sports.

He has published extensively in the scientific literature and is author or editor of a number of books on sports nutrition and exercise biochemistry. He is a member of the Editorial Board of several Journals, including the International Journal of Sports Nutrition & Exercise Metabolism, Experimental Physiology, the Journal of Sports Sciences, the International Journal of Sports Medicine & Nutrition.

Prof Louise Burke

Louise is a sports dietitian with nearly 30 years experience in the education and counselling of elite athletes. She has been head of the Department of Sports Nutrition at the Australian Institute of Sport since 1990. Her role as the dietitian for the Australian Swimming Team from 1991–2007 provided extensive overseas experience with the organisation of team travel and dietary concerns of the travelling athlete. She was the team dietitian for the Australian Olympic Teams for the 1996, 2000, 2004 & 2008 Olympic Games. Louise’s publications include 70 research papers in peer-reviewed journals, more than 40 book chapters, and the authorship or editorship of several textbooks on sports nutrition. She is an editor of the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism.

Her research interests include sports supplements and ergogenic aids, carbohydrate intake before, during and after exercise, dietary periodisation strategies for athletes, protein and the response to training, and hydration practices for training and competition. Louise was a founding member of the Executive of Sports Dietitians Australia and is a Director of the IOC Diploma in Sports Nutrition. She is a member of the Working Group on Nutrition for the International Olympic Committee, and the Medical and Anti-Doping Committee of the IAAF. She holds an Honorary Chair in Sports Nutrition, at Deakin University in Melbourne for contribution to research and post-graduate and undergraduate units in Sports Nutrition. She was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia in 2009 for her services to sports nutrition.

Dr Rod Jaques

Dr Rod Jaques is a Consultant in Sports and Exercise Medicine.

He did the London Hospital Diploma course in Sports Medicine qualifying with distinction and the David Ritchie prize in 1990. He also obtained the Society of Apothecaries Diploma in Sports Medicine. He is a Fellow of the Faculty of Sports and Exercise Medicine and is their current Vice-President.

Rod has been involved in Sports Medicine for the last 21 years and is National Medical Director at the English Institute of Sport (EIS) which services elite lottery funded athletes. He is based in the South West Region at Bath University .

He attended the Atlanta, Sydney, Athens and Beijing Olympics with Team GB and the Kuala Lumpur and Manchester Commonwealth Games with the England Team. From 1989–2007 he was Medical Advisor to the British Triathlon Association.

Rod was appointed to the British Olympic Medical Centre, London in 1998–2001 and joined the EIS in 2003. He also runs the Gloucestershire Sports Injury at the Winfield Hospital in Gloucester and works at the Droitwich Knee Clinic.

Dr Michael Turner

Chief Medical Advisor, Lawn Tennis Association
Chief Medical Advisor, British Horseracing Authority (formerly known as the Horseracing Regulatory Authority and The Jockey Club).

After qualifying at St. Thomas’ Hospital, Dr Michael Turner joined the British Ski Federation as their first Honorary Medical Advisor. While pursuing a career in occupational health, he undertook the traditional duties of a governing body Medical Advisor – travelling with the team, attending World Championships and assembling a network of medical and sports science support for the sport.

He attended the Winter Olympics at Calgary and the following year joined the British Olympic Association (BOA) as deputy Director of Medical Services. After the Winter Games in Albertville, he was appointed Director of Medical Services at the British Olympic Association and was given charge of Team GB at the Lillehammer Winter Games.

In 1992, he was approached by the Jockey Club to undertake a review of the medical arrangements in racing and was subsequently appointed as their Chief Medical Adviser in March 1993. Following the Lillehammer Games he relinquished his role with the BOA to take up post as the first Chief Medical Advisor to the Lawn Tennis Association. He currently divides his time between two professional sports – tennis and horseracing.

Michael is a keen skier and recreational tennis player and his particular areas of interest are safety in high-risk sports, protective equipment in sport, child protection, screening, concussion and doping control.

He is a former Treasurer of both the Institute of Sport and Exercise Medicine (ISEM) and the British Association of Sport and Exercise Medicine (BASEM), and a former member of the International Medical Committee of FIS (International Ski Federation). He is currently on the Editorial Board of the British Journal of Sports Medicine (BJSM) and the Journal of Medicine and Science in Tennis.

Dr Ken van Someren

Ken is the Director of Sport Sciences at the English Institute of Sport. He has worked as a sport physiologist with elite athletes and coaches across a wide range of sports for over 15 years. He holds BASES High Performance Sport Accreditation and previously chaired the BASES Division of Sport and Performance, serving on the BASES Board. Ken's research interests include exercise-induced muscle damage and recovery strategies; physiological determinants of sports performance; and methodological issues in physiological assessment – areas in which he has published extensively in sport and exercise science peer-reviewed journals. Ken holds honorary research positions at Kingston University and St Mary's University College.

Prof Andrew Jones

Andrew M Jones PhD took up his post as Professor of Applied Physiology at Exeter University in 2005. He is presently Head of Sport and Health Sciences and leader of the 'Bioenergetics and Human Performance' Research Group. Jones is internationally recognized for his research in the following areas: 1) control of, and limitations to, skeletal muscle oxidative metabolism; 2) causes of exercise intolerance in health and disease; 3) respiratory physiology, particularly the kinetics of pulmonary gas exchange and ventilation during and following exercise; and 4) sports performance physiology, particularly in relation to endurance athletics.

Recent work, in collaboration with colleagues in the Peninsula College of Medicine and Dentistry, has focused on the role of dietary nitrate in enhancing nitric oxide production and in modulating blood pressure, blood flow, and muscle efficiency and performance. Prof Jones has authored more than 140 original research and review articles and is co-editor of three books. Jones is a Fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine, the British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences, and the European College of Sports Sciences. He serves on the Editorial Board of nine journals in sports medicine and exercise science.

Prof Romain Meeusen

Romain Meeusen, (PhD) is head of the department of Human Physiology at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. His research interest is focussed on ‘Exercise and the Brain’ exploring the influence of neurotransmitters on human performance and training. Recent work is focussing on thermoregulation, Overtraining Syndrome, Neurogenesis. He teaches on exercise physiology, training & coaching and sports physiotherapy. Romain has published over 200 articles and book chapters in peer-reviewed journals, 18 books on sport physiotherapy, and gave lectures at more than 250 national and international conferences.

He is President of the Belgian Society for Sports Medicine and Sports Science and President Belgian Federation of Sports Physiotherapy. He is secretary general of the European College of Sport Science. In 2009 he received the Belgian ‘Francqui Chair’ at the Université Libre de Bruxelles on ‘Exercise and the Brain’. He is also holder of two named lecturing chairs at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel – where he is director of the Human Performance Lab, working with several top athletes – and is scientific advisor of the ‘Lotto Cycling Institute’ (Silence-Lotto professional cycling team).

Prof Jorunn Sundgot-Borgen

Jorunn Sundgot-Borgen is a Professor of Physical Activity and Health at the Department of Sports Medicine at the Norwegian School of Sport Sciences. She is also vice-chair of the National Council on Physical Activity. For 10 years she also was at the Medical Department at the National Olympic Training Centre and Chair of the Nutrition Department. Under the auspieces of the I.O.C Medical Commission she was part of the following working groups; The Female Athlete Triad Working Group and is part of an ad-hoc Research Working Group on body composition, health and performance. She was co-author of the ACSM position paper on the Female Athlete Triad. Her main research area is the female athlete triad. Professor Sundgot-Borgen is also a former national team gymnast and coach, and has three children.

Dr David Martin

David received his B.Sci. degree in Zoology from the College of Idaho, his M.Sci. degree in Exercise Physiology from Northern Michigan University and his Ph.D. in Physiology from the University of Wyoming. Before beginning doctoral studies, David worked as a research assistant at the United States Olympic Training Centre in Colorado Springs Colorado. Master's research focused on stability of the “Anaerobic Threshold” training intensity and doctoral research was aimed at better understanding peaking, tapering and overtraining in cyclists.

David is currently a senior sports physiologist working within the Department of Physiology at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra and is also the National Sport Science Coordinator for Cycling Australia. Sport science support for Australian Cycling teams has been provided by David in the lead up to the 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008 Olympic Games.

Dr Marco Cardinale

Dr. Marco Cardinale is the Head of Sports Science and Research of the British Olympic Association. Dr. Cardinale is also the director of the Science and Research Unit of the British Olympic Medical Institute based in University College London, Institute of Sport Exercise and Health.

Dr. Cardinale led the Sports Science activities for the preparation of Team GB at the Beijing 2008 and Vancouver 2010 Olympic Games.

A widely published and cited author in the scientific literature on various aspects of human performance, he has also patented an innovative exercise device consisting of a vibratory biofeedback system. Dr. Cardinale holds two honorary academic appointments one at University College London in the division of surgical and interventional medicine and one at the University of Aberdeen in the School of Medical Sciences. He has been an advisor to various companies (e.g. Polar Electro, Medisport and Technogym), government agencies (e.g. the European Space Agency) and professional sport organizations and national governing bodies in 4 countries (USA, Italy, Spain, Sweden) before working in the UK.

Dr. Cardinale has been invited speaker in scientific conferences and coaching clinics in 21 countries and has been ad-hoc reviewer for over 15 scientific journals and various research councils.

Prof Hugh Montgomery

Hugh Montgomery is Professor of Intensive Care Medicine at University College London, where he also directs the UCL Institute for Human Health and Performance. He obtained a 1st class degree in Cardiorespiratory, Physiology and Neuropharmacology in 1984, before graduating from the Middlesex Hospital Medical School in 1987. He obtained hs MD in 1997, and has since led an expanding research group. he reported the 'first gene for human fitness', and has since published over 200 peer-reviewed scientific papers.

Dr Eric Goulet

Since 2009, Dr. Eric Goulet has been an adjunct professor of exercise physiology and a researcher at the Research Center on Ageing of the University of Sherbrooke. From 2003 to 2009, Eric completed a Ph.D. (University of Sherbrooke) as well as a postdoctoral fellowships (McGill University) in physiology.

Dr. Goulet's research focuses on two main themes: 1) physical training and insulin resistance in the aged persons and; 2) hydration and performance in the aged and trained athletes. More specifically, he is searching for training techniques, dietary supplements or nutritional strategies with potential to maximize the effect of physical training on glucose regulation and tries to understand how hyperhydration influences endurance performance and how hypohydration affects muscle strength and endurance. He is also actively pursuing studies to try better understanding the relationship between exercise-induced dehydration, endurance performance and thirst sensation.

Having been a successful long-distance triathlete for the past 15 years, Eric is particularly interested in designing and completing studies whose findings can be readily used and applied by athletes and coaches. Dr. Goulet has authored 9 peer-reviewed publications related to endurance performance and hydration and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Exercise Physiology online.

Nathan Lewis

Nathan Lewis is currently a senior performance nutritionist for the English Institute of Sport (EIS), and joint EIS technical lead for the south west & central region. He has been with the EIS for both the Beijing and now the London Olympic cycle; leading the nutrition service for British Modern Pentathlon and Olympic Sailing. Nathan also works as a consultant for Hodgson-Moore Pathology Services delivering haematological, biochemical and immunological analysis in elite sport through a global network of accredited laboratories. His research interests in athletes centres around nutritional biomarkers, with a current focus on vitamin D. Prior to moving to the EIS, Nathan spent 6 years working in clinically, specialising in eating disorders, parenteral nutrition and critical care.

Nathan undertook his bachelor of sciences degree in Human Nutrition, his state registration in Dietetics at the University of Wales Institute of Cardiff, his clinical training at Norfolk and Norwich NHS trust, and his master's degree in Sports Nutrition at Aberdeen University, where he was awarded the Universities biomedical sciences award for outstanding academic performance.

Prof Paul Chung

Paul is the Director of the Research School of Informatics at Loughborough University. After obtaining his bachelor degree in Computing Science from Imperial College in 1981 he went on to study for his PhD in Artificial Intelligence at the University of Edinburgh in 1984. He joined Loughborough University in 1991 and was appointed Professor of Computer Science in 1999. He has successfully supervised over 20 Doctorate students and has over 200 publications. Paul's main research interest is in applying advanced computing techniques to solve novel complex problems. His current projects involve investigating the use of image processing to analyse athletes performance.

Prof Stuart Phillips

Stuart graduated with a Ph.D. from the University of Waterloo in Human Physiology in 1995. For two years he was a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Robert Wolfe's laboratory at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, Texas. He returned to McMaster in 1997 and is now a Professor in the Department of Kinesiology and an Adjunct Professor in the School of Medicine at McMaster University. He has received both Graduate Student and New Investigator Awards from the Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology and is a fellow of the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) and the American College of Nutrition (ACN). His research is focused on the impact of nutrition and exercise on human skeletal muscle protein turnover. As well he is keenly interested in diet and exercise-induced changes in body composition.

His research is funded by the Canadian Institutes for Health Research, the National Science and Engineering Council of Canada, and the Canadian Foundation for Innovation as well as the USDA. An enthusiastic and energetic group of graduate students are the true heart of Dr. Phillips’ more than 160 publications and continuing enthusiasm for science and research.

Dr Enette Larson-Meyer

Enette Larson-Meyer, PhD, RD, CSSD, FACSM, is a registered dietitian and exercise physiologist who currently teaches and conducts research at the University of Wyoming. Her research interests focus on how nutrition influences the health and performance of active individuals at all stages of the lifecycle and at all levels of performance – from the casual exerciser to the elite athlete.

Most recently, Dr Larson-Meyer has become interested in the vitamin D status of athletes and its potential influence on the health and performance of athletes and active individuals. Dr Larson-Meyer is the former sports nutritionist for the University of Alabama at Birmingham Blazers, is the author of "Vegetarian Sports Nutrition. Food choices and Eating Plans for Fitness and Performance" (Human Kinetics, 2007), and currently works mostly with endurance and vegetarian athletes.

She is active in both the American College of Sports Medicine and The Sports Cardiovascular and Wellness Nutrition (SCAN) Practice Group of the American Dietetic Association, and is currently serving as Chair-Elect of SCAN. Her personal interests include trail running, flat-water kayaking, Irish step dancing and chasing after her three young "athletic children".

Dr John Tanner

Dr John Tanner qualified in 1977 and trained first as a GP before specialising in orthopaedic and sports medicine. He ran a sports injury clinic in Milton Keynes for seven years and a medical osteopathic practice in Bermuda for four years. On his return to the UK, Dr Tanner developed the Oving Clinic, a multidisciplinary practice in West Sussex.

Dr Tanner has been running a successful practice in Guildford for the last five years and carries out procedures at Mount Alvernia Hospital. Previous to this, he worked for ten years as an Associate Specialist at Odstock Rehabilitation in the Pain Management team. He then went on to work in orthopaedics at Worthing for two years.

He pioneered the use of extracorporeal shockwave therapy in tendinopathy in the UK, and has a special interest in chronic musculoskeletal and spinal pain, interventional pain relief techniques and psychological management. He has used prolotherapy for spinal instability problems for over 25 years and teaches and trains doctors in this technique.

Dr Tanner has authored three books 'Better Back', 'Your Guide to Back Pain' commissioned by the RSM and recently 'Back Care' with the BMA. Dr Tanner is an Instructor for the International Spinal Intervention Society and sits on its European Faculty. He has set up a new Post Graduate training course for doctors in Musculoskeletal Medicine, teaching regularly throughout the UK. Dr Tanner works at BUPA Health and Wellbeing as Co Clinical Lead at the Barbican. He takes referrals from GPs and colleagues covering a wide range of musculoskeletal and other problems.

Prof Barbara Livingstone

Current Position: Professor of Human Nutrition, University of Ulster, Northern Ireland.
She has been a member of staff at the University of Ulster since 1984.

Her research interests include: dietary and lifestyle risk factors for obesity, particularly in children and adolescents; development of educational intervention strategies for the prevention of childhood obesity; mechanisms of control of appetite, satiety and food intake; and development of evidence based dietary guidelines for healthy eating.

She has published more than 100 research papers. She is currently a Scientific Governor of the British Nutrition Foundation and a Member of the Northern Ireland Food Advisory Committee (Food Standards Agency). She chairs the Data and Research Advisory Group of the N. Ireland Obesity Prevention Steering Group

Dr Graeme Wilkes

Graeme’s home is in Newcastle where he Is Senior Sports Physician to the English Institute of Sport based in Gateshead. He is dual qualified as a GP and Sports & Exercise Medicine Consultant. He has worked in elite sport for 15 years since first taking a role as Club Doctor with Newcastle Falcons Rugby Club in 1996, a role he held until 2010. He has been the sole Sports Physician as part of a multi-disciplinary team, working at the English Institute of Sport in the North-East since 2003 with a variety of elite athletes. He has worked at numerous UK Athletics meetings as event doctor and with the England Cricket team. He is club doctor to Newcastle Eagles basketball team, who have been the top UK team over many years. Graeme attended the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi as England HQ doctor and most recently travelled with GB Men’s Hockey Team to Malaysia for the Azlan Shah Hockey Tournament.

Graeme spends part of his week in Sport and the remainder as Clinical Lead for Connect Physical Health, an independent provider of community musculoskeletal services to  the NHS in the North-East and London.

Outside of work Graeme has three children, coaches an under-15 rugby team and plays keyboard in an ageing rock band.