Showing posts with label SPORTS. Show all posts

Sunday, April 28, 2013

LIFESTYLE AND NEWS - New cycle tracks in Dubai: RTA planning cycling routes for 11 neighbourhoods - UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

Dh40 million project to be completed by 2016

Dubai: Cycling enthusiasts in Dubai are in for a treat as projects to build new tracks across 11 locations in the city have been launched, the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) has announced.

The announcement from RTA comes close on the heels of opening a 75-km long Dubai Cycling Course in Seih Assalam, part of a cycling master plan that includes a 25km track in Jumeirah as well as smaller tracks near Mall of the Emirates, Al Mamzar Park and Al Mizhar Park.

Apart from these tracks, RTA is currently constructing a 4.5-km-long track in the central district of Bur Dubai, and has completed the designs of four tracks linking Jumeirah Road with four Metro stations on Shaikh Zayed Road. Additionally, the authority has completed the construction of 1,400 bike racks around all Metro stations.

Following the successful implementation of the first phase of the cycling master plan, RTA has now approved construction of cycling tracks in 11 residential areas stretching 52km at a cost of Dh40 million.

“The construction of the cycling tracks is part of a master plan developed by RTA to provide dedicated cycling spaces across the entire Dubai emirate in a bid to encourage the use of bikes as an environment-friendly transit means, as well as for the benefit of cycling enthusiasts,” said Mattar Al Tayer, Chairman of the Board and Executive Director of RTA.

Work on the new cycling tracks will begin this year and will be completed by 2016.

Residential areas like Al Barsha, Al Khawaneej, Al Warqa, Al Quoz, Al Safouh Road, Al Mamzar Park, Mushrif Park, Hor Al Anz East, and Mirdif, have been selected for the project.

Al Tayer said the areas were selected based on various parameters including their popularity with tourists and their aesthetic nature. The areas are also frequented by cyclists and serve the Metro and public transport stations.

“The design of the tracks has been tailored to ensure the security and safety of bikers and the locations have been selected keeping in mind the convenience of residents and visitors to the areas, suitability of the site, traffic safety, and the appeal to pedestrians,” added Al Tayer.

Al Tayer said that since 2008 RTA has developed a Cycling Master Plan that included charting routes for bikes within the rights-of-way as well as separate lanes.

The Plan detailed the specifications and standards of separating cycling tracks from pedestrian pathways, and addressed the intersection points with cycling tracks, provision of biking racks in general and at the public transport stations in particular, cycling lanes in entertainment areas, materials to be used in the construction of cycling tracks, and signage for bikes and tracks.

So far the biggest of the cycling projects constructed by the RTA has been the 75-km-long Dubai Cycling Course. The first part of this course stretching 18km alongside Al Qudra Road North was opened in January. The second part of the course, which was opened in March, stretches about 49km, starting from the front of Bab Al Shams Hotel up to Al Qudra Road roundabout, then turns southward alongside the road leading to Seih Assalam.

The course includes public utilities and shops for hiring bikes, gear and accessories in addition to a medical clinic.

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

HEALTH - Stay active if you want to stay alive - AUSTRALIA

Illustration: Kerrie Leishman

FORGIVE me for saying so, but don't you think you'd be better off going for a run - even a brisk walk - than reaching for another fruit-mince pie? Chances are you don't think it. Or maybe you think it, but you don't intend to act on it. If you can't take a day off on Boxing Day, when can you?

I hate to say it, but humans have a slothful streak. We want to live comfortable, enjoyable lives and we assume the less physical effort this involves the better. But one of the most unremarked and remarkable discoveries of our times is that it doesn't work like that.

As a writer about economics, I suppose I'm required to be an advocate of progress. A major element of humankind's progress - of our civilisation - has been our unrelenting efforts to take the effort out of all we're required to do to live our lives. That story begins with our discovery of first stone, then metal tools. It progresses to our discovery that settling in one spot and farming crops and animals was a lot safer, more comfortable and prosperity-inducing than hunting and gathering.

Fast forward to the industrial revolution, which began in the second half of the 18th century. It, too, was fundamentally about taking the physical effort out of work, first with the discovery of steam power, then later, electricity and the internal combustion engine - all of them powered by the burning of fossil fuels.

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Along the way we invented a multitude of ways to mechanise work - from the spinning jenny to the typewriter - thereby greatly reducing the number of workers needed to produce a given quantity of goods and services or, looking at it another way, allowing a given number of workers to produce a much greater quantity of goods and services.

Whichever way you look at it, our unceasing search for new and better ''labour-saving'' devices has greatly increased the productivity of our labour - the quantity of goods and services the average worker is able to produce in an hour - and this explains why our material standard of living is much higher than at the time of white settlement in Australia.

Usually, this is what economists portray as the object of this grand exercise, making ourselves richer. But it's equally true that a central element of the exercise has involved taking the physical exertion out of work. We haven't ended up doing a lot less work than we used to, but our work has become much less physical and much more mental, requiring us to be a lot better educated and trained.

More recently - and particularly with the advent of the information revolution - we've moved from taking the physical effort out of work to also taking it out of leisure. We drive when we could walk or ride around our suburbs at the weekend. For home entertainment we no longer sing or recite to each other, but turn on an electronic device. And the commercialisation of sport means not only that we watch professionals rather than playing ourselves, but needn't even leave the house to watch a game.

This is where we've overreached, however. This is where nature is striking back. Combine the way machine-produced food has never been more enticing, more plentiful or as cheap with the success of our efforts to strip physical exertion from work and leisure, and you get an obesity epidemic.

And it's not just that. As each year passes the medicos uncover ever more evidence of the many ways our lack of exercise is contributing to our ill health, including heart disease, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, cancer, depression and anxiety, arthritis and osteoporosis.

To put it more positively, and to borrow a slogan from the American College of Sports Medicine, exercise is medicine. This is what I find so remarkable, so surprising.

Recent research by medicos in Texas found that previously sedentary women who began moderate aerobic exercise a third of the way into their pregnancy had significantly fewer caesarean deliveries and recovered faster after the birth.

Research by Dr Dick Telford and colleagues at the Australian National University has found that primary school children who are more physically active and leaner get better academic results and, even more so, that primary schools with fitter children achieve better literacy and numeracy.

Research quoted on the Exercise is Medicine website says active people in their 80s have a lower risk of death than inactive people in their 60s.

Regular physical activity can reduce the risk of recurrent breast cancer by about half, lower the risk of colon cancer by more than 60 per cent, reduce the risk of Alzheimer's, heart disease and high blood pressure by about 40 per cent and lower the risk of stroke by 27 per cent. It can decrease depression as effectively as Prozac or behavioural therapy.

According to the site, a low level of fitness is a bigger risk factor for mortality than mild-to-moderate obesity. And regular physical activity has been shown to lead to higher university entrance scores.

But here's the bit I like best (and know from experience is true): research shows that exercise makes you feel better, reducing stress, helping you sleep better and feel more energetic. The unexpected truth is that it's exertion, not the avoidance of it, that makes you happy.

Monday, September 17, 2012

HEALTH - Kids need, first of all, the movement, not the exercise - ESTONIA

Kids need, first of all, the movement, not the exercise

17.09.2012 10: 21

Spordipedagoog recommends that parents exercise itself rather than the child sõidutamise and dressid together with the back yard to move with the child to go to.

Although in recent times has put the already paariaastased jõnglased exercise habit, not a lecturer at the University of Tallinn spordipedagoogika Piisang trend more than glad. Marion «According to Sporditeooria, it shall be sufficient if the kids go seitsmeaastaselt the six-ammunition, because then they would have also been organised activities and new peer can lead better, '' he acknowledged.

At the same time, it also can be found in spordialasid, which is seven years too young to boot. For example, network and learning basketball easier for 10 to 12 years of age, or when wrist is sufficiently developed and käelihased. "You may say that the sports that require skill, can carry on more than force, and resilience," requiring a sports lecturer spoke.

Young children being Piisang don't need to exercise reasonable, because the ability to focus on tasks in children has not been for a longer period of time. May deliver babies for wants. «Liikumistunnid Three is 15-20 minutes in the kindergarten long and even there was a situation in which children became the nööre tasakaalukõndi had to be made, a total of rullima. They were tired, organised activities» Piisang who have worked, told the kindergarten liikumisõpetajana.

For Lasteaialaste is the best workout move with the child to the parents, because that is waiting for him to deal with his issues, and close to the people, stated Piisang.

«Dear parents, don't algklassiõpilaste preparatory groups for pre-school and vaevake need it, what sport your child fits best. Please go to dressid and back with her child in the yard to run, play ball, ronige, * igital and * analogue channels., go cycling, summer and winter suusatage matkake ujuge, and uisutage. Your child can be Olympic champion but when he wants to play it yourself, and if all the existing preparation shall obtain the permits, '' he said.

Children should be Piisangu, at least 60 minutes per day for such activity, which is confusing them sweat, hingeldama. «Cycling, running, Climbing, jumping to a crawl — these are called viskamine, põhiliikumisviisideks and they are acquired with the support of daily physical activity. Põhiliikumisviiside sure possession of sports provides a basis for State-of-the-art learning.»

Today's children have physical education lessons for training taking and often difficult due to the fact that they do not have normal liikumisoskuste base. "It is important to ensure that the child every day, not just twice a week could," stressed Piisang trennis.

Children's sport in person, so your good and not so good sides. "If the activity for a child like, if it is him, and gives the child the opportunity to experience can complete eduelamust all well," teaching staff spoke. Unfortunately, however, for situations where the parents do not like the selected task to the child, and in this case, it may happen that the child renounces murdeeas have been received by the sport.

«Sports for children and young people is the greatest current threat to early specialisation. Ühekülgne does not create a basis for my workout, what careers might have many parent would expect, '' said.

Spordipedagoogi's investigations have shown that the children at first fun and exercise attracts a fascinating activity, not võistluslikkus. "It (võitluslikkus – ed.) is the fourth among the boys somewhere among the sportimismotiivide, girls, this is no more,» he explained yet.

Recommendations

• Children are encouraged to move at least 60 minutes per day and at least five days per week.

• Movement may be shorter time periods.

• Load could be between moderate and heavy («ajav» hingeldama and sweat).

• It is recommended that prior to arrival in the murdeikka and murdeeas on two occasions per week your bones and muscles are pursued by an incentive travel – pallimängud, aerobics, etc.

Thursday, August 30, 2012

HEALTH AND LIFE - 'I look to the positives rather than the ifs or the buts' - IRELAND

Cathal Miller is the flag bearer for the Paralympics, which opens tomorrow night.Photograph: Eric Luke

MY HEALTH EXPERIENCE: I’ve often thought what it would be like to have two arms, says CATHAL MILLER

I WAS born without a right arm below my elbow. I can only speculate why, but my father, Charles Miller, who is originally from the Bronx, was an American soldier in Vietnam in 1965 and 1966 and he was exposed to Agent Orange.

There are numerous cases of the children of Vietnam veterans being born with disabilities.

One-armed people are not that common in Ireland, but the world is full of them. When I walked into the athletes’ village in Beijing in 2008 there must have been 1,000-1,500 arm amputees. I was in awe of that fact. I am part of an independent race of human beings.

I’m originally from Clontarf. I was very lucky growing up. I was in the sea scouts down on Bull Island. I discovered I had an ability to play rugby. For me to get to where I was on the team, I had to be fitter than everybody else. I would run five or six miles every evening and do extra weight sessions just to make up for my disability. I just adapted to it.

I was lucky in that I had good hand eye co-ordination. My ball-handling skills with one arm were quite good.

I played rugby in primary schools and then I went to school in St Paul’s in Raheny where I played in a Senior Cup semi-final at Lansdowne Road in 1986.

Simultaneously I played with Clontarf under-18s in rugby and got junior player of the year in 1989. I had a couple of run-outs with the senior team too.

I went from Clontarf to another club to play open side wing forward and I was quite good at that. I had a good arm and a half. I really enjoyed it.

I’m lucky that my mother is a qualified physiotherapist so from the age of three or four I was doing exercises. I started canoeing when I was eight or nine in the sea scouts and that developed me on both sides simultaneously.

I have got an artificial arm and I use a split hook. Some people have an artificial arm for aesthetic purposes, but in my opinion you are better off having something that works rather than something that looks good.

I would be in the school of “suck it up, who cares what other people think. So what if people stare. They’ll get over it.”

Using the hook, I can repair my bike, I can play with my children, I can carry the shopping and drive the car. For me, practicality is much more important than aesthetics.

I always cycled my bike and a friend of mine, Michael Delaney, who is another Paralympian, approached me and asked me if I would pedal a tandem with him for a National Council for the Blind of Ireland (NCBI) sports event in 2005.

We were third. One of the teams we beat had been at the Paralympics games in Athens the year before.

Between us we purchased a tandem and we ended up doing the Tour of Belgium on a tandem which would have been in May or June in 2006.

Between us we had three arms, four eyes and three and a half ears (Mick is partially deaf) and we came in the top 30 among the best tandem riders in the world. We were chuffed with that.

It became apparent that Mick was very good in the back, but my skills at the front were not quite as good. I was okay on the straight, but it was difficult to corner when I could use only one brake so Mick got a new partner.

I was approached by the Paralympics squad and asked would I race a solo bike so I agreed.

I did the European Championships in 2006. It was not an auspicious start, but I joined a cycling club called Obelisk and I met three guys, Mark McCabe, Ger Madden and Robert Kehoe, who started training me and in 2007 I went to the Paracycling World Championships in Switzerland. I got three top 10 finishes.

I represented Ireland in the Paralympics in Beijing in 2008. The whole experience was fantastic although I had bad luck in the road race.

I was fifth in the pursuit and missed the ride-off for medals by three or four seconds. I was ninth in the time trial, seventh in the kilo (one kilometre race) and crashed out of the road race.

I was asked by my coach if I would do it again and I immediately said yes.

It was an incredible experience.

In 2010 I got the medal ride-off in pursuit of the World Championship.

In the last two world championships I’ve missed the ride-off by a second. It is about time I had a little bit of luck.

The entire Paralympian squad voted for who would carry the flag and luckily they chose me.

I’m under pressure because I’m carrying the flag for the Irish team. How am I going to emulate Katie Taylor? Somebody said to me that I can’t let a girl beat me.

I am married to Anne and I have a seven year old, Aaron, and a 12 year old, Saoirse. They are going to see me in the velodrome on September 1st and 2nd and they might see why I couldn’t take them swimming or cycling on a Saturday morning for the last while.

I’m looking forward to London and I’m looking forward to having my family there.

I’ve often thought what it would be like to have two arms. Sometimes it gets frustrating. There were times in rugby when there was a try scoring pass on that I dropped the ball and I would say, “if I had two arms I would have scored it”, but I am what I am.

I work for the Revenue Commissioners and have received fantastic support from my work colleagues. I’m very lucky. I’ve had a very lucky life. I have great family, great support and great friends. From that perspective I look to the positives.

Lots of people have wished me well. I look to the positives rather than the ifs or the buts.

I think we are going to do better than in Beijing when we won five medals. We have competitors like Jason Smyth, the double Paralympics champion, Mike McKillip, Catherine Walsh and James Scully who are all fantastic athletes and who train very hard.

A lot of people look at the Paralympics and say, “aren’t they fantastic for what they can do” and rightly so, but people do not appreciate that there are a lot of things they can’t do, but they compensate for them in other ways. In doing so, it makes them even more superhuman.

The Paralympics Opening Ceremony is tomorrow night.

Monday, July 9, 2012

HEALTH - GOOD ADVICES - INDIA

Run, even if you don't like to

The writer has posted comments on this articleTNN | Jul 10, 2012, 12.00AM IST

Run, even if you don't like to

We give you reasons why you should do it

Whether you like it or not, running is one of the best forms of exercise to keep yourself fit — and not just that, it's great for weight control as well. A 30 to 45 minute run, about three to four times a week, will trim your waistline, strengthen your cardiovascular system and even help foster a positive mental attitude. We list some reasons why you should start running today...

- One of the quickest way to cardiovascular fitness, the more frequently you run, the fitter you get.

- You don't need to invest in heavy-duty equipment in order to start running. Get yourself a pair of sturdy running shoes, a couple of track pants, shorts and tees, and you're ready to go.

- You don't need to be a long distance runner in order to be a good runner. Running is easy to learn. Just make sure your posture is correct when you run.

- Not only is running good for your physical state, it is also mentally stimulating.

- Feeling stressed? Get out and run! Experts say that running is great for reducing stress levels. When you run, it helps clear your head and concentrate better.

- Running is one of the most flexible methods of training — no matter where you are or how old you are, it is nearly always possible to step out for a jog.

- Not only does running strengthen your heart but also reduces the actual resting heart rate.

- Running helps you lose weight and tones your muscles by getting rid of excess fat and converting it to muscle. The more you run, the more weight you lose.

- Research also says that running is good for your sex drive.

- Got a hangover? Running is a great way to recover because a run helps clear your head faster than just sitting around nursing your headache.

- You don't need to run alone. Ask a friend to accompany you. This way you can have company as well as encourage each other.

- Running improves your concentration because when you run, you're forced to concentrate more.

- The endurance you build up through running is useful for other sports as well.