Made it!

Ciao, buon giorno! Sorry I don't have any pictures to post yet, but I just landed 3 hours ago. I've been up for quite some time, so I apologize if this isn't as coherent or interesting as you would like! The trip over can be summed up in the best adjective possible for an "across the pond" flight - UNEVENTFUL!

Leave it to Chris to ask me what in the world is my function here! Actually, that's a great question! As a physiologist, my role of testing the athletes is pretty much done at this point. There's no point in testing an athlete for maximal aerobic or anaerobic power now - the ultimate test of that will come on the field of play over the next few weeks. We are prepared to do pulmonary function tests on athletes if they are experiencing breathing problems (the pollution here is pretty bad), but we've tested just about everyone on Team USA for asthma and exercise-induced asthma over the last quad (quadrennium).

As a Dietitian (nutritionist), my role here will be to make sure our athletes have everything they need when they need it. Acutally, not many people in the world does food better than the Italians, who are in charge of providing meals in the athlete villages. In fact, they do it too well - we'll have to make sure our atheltes don't stray too far from their nutriton plans and put on weight before their events! Also, making sure the athletes are eating familiar, "tried and true" foods and beverages is essential right now. More than one athlete in the history of sport has ruined 4 years of hard training with one bad meal the night before, or day of, a competition. A few of the teams travel with their own Dietitians and chefs, so I will just be coordinating their needs.

It's expensive and cumbersome to bring a large delegation to the Games, so those of us that do come are expected to fill many roles. In addition to being a physiologist and Dietitian, I am also a grunt for our Performance Technology Dept (my Division back in the Springs is Sport Sciences and Performance Technology). We have purchased the rights to the "live feed" here at the Games and will be taping events live as they happen. The live feed is simply footage being fed from cameras live at the events. No commercials, no commentary, no nothing but live action. As in Athens, I may have to actually go to events (as opposed to sitting in our High Performance Center running taping equipment), and record the events from the stands. All this footage can then be captured into software programs and digitized, analyzed, and basically picked apart for our teams to view and learn from.

So, in a nut shell, that's how I'm contributing to the success of Team USA. Keep asking questions, so I can have some focus to my ramblings! I'll write more after I've had some shut-eye!