Chapter 11 - Methods Used to Enhance Athletic Performance ____________________________________________________________________________________
Biorhythms ______________________________________________
You would probably be hard pressed to convince many people that biorhythms don’t have a significant impact on human performance. In fact, many people now believe that biorhythms may be one of the missing links that explains human behavior. The impact of biorhythmic effects is being felt in just about every walk of life, from medicine to aviation to education to science. Not surprisingly, a great deal of interest also exits concerning the interrelationship of sports and biorhythms. Some people, including athletes, schedule their entire life around biorhythms. In case you have been living in a cave for the last decade, let me try to explain to you what biorhythms are and how they supposedly work. According to biorhythm theory, each individual has three body cycles which regulate physical strength, emotion, and intelligence…a twenty three day physical stamina cycle, a twenty eight day emotional cycle, and a thirty three day intellectual cycle. These cycles are assumed to be determined at birth and to be invariant throughout life. According to the theory, the cycles have the following effects: during the positive phase of the twenty three day physical- cycle we are stronger, have greater endurance, and are more resistant to disease. During the negative phase, the reverse is true. Similarly, during the positive phase of the twenty eight day cycle of emotional sensitivity, we feel more positive optimistic, and creative, whereas we are most irritable, withdrawn, and pessimistic during the negative phase. With respect to the thirty three day intellectual cycle, thinking is clearer and more decisive during the positive phase, whereas the opposite is true during the negative phase. If you don’t understand what I am talking about, fake take it, because there is no way I can make this stuff any easier. Either way, don’t worry, because they have computers that will calculate all this stuff for you. Moving right along, biorhythm cycles have the patterns sine waves. More confused, right? Like I said, fake it. Since they have different durations, they coincide at times, but arc in opposition at other times. The so called critical days for each cycle occur at the beginning and middle of each cycle, when the phase changes direction from positive to negative, or vice versa. On these days, we are in a transition state and as a result, we are most vulnerable. We are weaker, more likely to become emotionally disturbed, and make more mistakes. Proponents of the biorhythm theory claim that an individual can use his knowledge of what biorhythmic phase he is in to compensate for low periods. That is, he could be more careful, undertake less demanding tasks, or avoid strenuous activities during that