OPENING ADDRESS
Authors: Eldon Griffiths
Journal: British Journal of Sports Medicine (1973)

The talks and the discussions which are to take place during this Congress inevitably and rightly will do so against the background of a World wide explosion in sport.I welcome this explosion, and think you will agree that there are a number of good reasons for it.One reason is more people, especially more young people, are engaging in physical activity.Another is more leisure, and more affluence.A third reason suspect is the desire to escape from the more mechanised and prepackaged aspects of our society.More of us feel the need to express our own physical personality through participation in sport.All these factors, submit, have generated a quantitative explosion.But there is a qualitative upsurge too.Competition is increasing.Standards are improving greatly.To some extent, this improvement in standards is a product of better facilities of more sophisticated training methods, of scientific coaching and very much better equipment.Pole vaulting is just one example: Between 1942 and 1960 the world record was broken only twice, and in that time the height cleared was raised by only 11/2".Since 1961, however, when the fibre-glass pole was introduced, the record has been broken many times and has been raised by over 2 feet.The development of the tartan track has also had a considerable effect on runners and hurdlers.It was on the tartan surface at Crystal Palace, for instance that David Hemery broke the 110 yards hurdles record in May 1969.These are great achievements.But it is a question hope you will discuss, as to how far we should go in providing what some may call artificial aids to record-breaking.I am not thinking here of the arguments over running shoes or steak for oarsmen.More important is the question of how far it should be permissible if indeed it is permissible at all -to use dietary or chemical stimulants to improve performance.To what extent, if at all is the use of amphetamines safe?No doubt you will be considering these and related questions.But allow me to express my personal view that in individual contests, the victory nearly always will go to that sportsman who in the end is mentally, not just physically, prepared to drive himself the hardest -to stretch his limbs beyond endurance; to produce that last extra gasp; to give more than he has, or more than he thinks that he has, in order to reach the tape first.On this subject, quote the works of Dr. Roger Bannister.He wrote in Volume Two of "Structure and Function of Muscle" (1960): "The difference between athletes lies not entirely in difference of cardiac output or diffusion capacity; it lies, rather, in their capacity for mental excitement, which brings with it an ability to overcome or ignore the discomfort, even pain, in the muscles and in the brain, which is probably caused by ischaemia and the consequent changes of blood lactate concentration and pH."So, as Bannister puts it, "physiology may well indicate respiratory and circulatory limits to muscular exercise, but it is psychological and other factors, beyond the ken of physiology, that set the razor's edge of defeat or victory, and determine how closely an athlete approaches the absolute limits of performance".No doubt you will be discussing this question in some detail.I feel sure that it will bring you up against the question of sporting injuries.Much good work already has been undertaken and more is under way.am glad to say that the Sports Council has itself been active in helping to sponosr research.There was, for instance, the report from the Royal College of Physicians on the medical aspects of boxing (1969).The Sports Council assisted in this worthwhile project which revealed valuable new information on the extent to which boxers could now suffer brain damage as a result of their careers in the ring.