Ian Poulter

Sports psychology has been around for many years but over the past few years there has been an increase in various aids to help golfers concentrate and focus their mind including the wearing of wrist bands.  Power Balance® is one such product. The band is made of durable coloured rubber with a hologram on either side.  The Power Balance® wrist band is allegedly “designed to react positively with your body’s natural energy field.”

Their website states people have reported improved performance when wearing the product and have experienced improved game performance when wearing Power Balance®.

Among the many sports men and women that are wearing Power Balance® wrist bands are footballers David Beckham and Darren Bent, F1 driver Rubens Barichello, pro golfers Ian Poulter, Hunter Mahan and Ricky Barnes, tennis players Victoria Azarenka and Mardy Fish, and members of the London Wasps and England Cricket teams.

“I have been wearing a Power Balance bracelet for the past few months now and I love it. It allows me to play golf at a higher level. In fact, I wear the bracelet both on and off the golf course. Plus, they are stylish and allow me to add a little flair to my outfits.” Ian Poulter – Golf

Sceptics will question the claims made by the company and how wearing a bracelet can affect your performance; and there will always be those who don’t believe in something without scientific proof.

I’ve been wearing the wrist band on and off over the past week and wonder if it actually works or that wearing it makes me believe I should feel more focused in what I am doing.

Because the company suggest the Power Balance® may not work for everyone the product is sold with a no-quibble money-back guarantee.

The Power Balance® is available from www.powerbalanceuk.com priced £29.99.

The Pink Panthers

A team of footballers from Loughborough are taking a well deserved rest today after setting a new Guinness World Record for the world’s longest football match while raising money for Breast Cancer Campaign.

Captain Ricardo Braganza and 35 fellow players at Loughborough University played for a staggering 60 hours from 9am on Friday 22 October until the final whistle blew at 9pm on Sunday 24 October. The previous official record, set by the Challengers and the Crunchers in Qatar, is 42 hours.

The Black Eagles

The Pink Panthers won the match beating The Black Eagles 756 – 746 and an official adjudicator from Guinness World Records was on hand to announce the new record.

Ricardo, 21, from Ilford, Essex, organised the football-athon to raise funds for Breast Cancer Campaign after his mother was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008. So far, the thrilled maths student has raised more than £18,000 to help fund world-class breast cancer research.

He said afterwards: “My team mates and I can’t believe we’re world record breakers, it’s such an amazing achievement for us. The game was extremely tough but we knew the money raised from this challenge was going towards a worthwhile cause, so we just had to keep going. It was really rainy and windy on the Friday night but we had fantastic support from friends and family so that helped us to carry on. It’s incredible to think we played for 60 hours and set a new world record.”

Each footballer played for two hours at a time with a one-hour break in-between. Under Guinness World Record rules, they were not allowed to leave the pitch at any point during the attempt and spent time sleeping in two-man tents on the sidelines.

Karen Lambert, Events Executive at Breast Cancer Campaign, said: “I’m so proud of Ricardo and his team for smashing the previous world record and for raising so much money to help us continue our mission to beat breast cancer. They all trained for months to be physically ready for this and it’s good to see their hard work and determination has paid off.”

Players on the two teams were Black Eagles: Ricardo Braganza, Andrew Wishart, Sam Whelan, Alex Corck-Adelman, Alexei Christofi, Michael Thomas, Dan Greenway, Tom Burgess, Matt Whitehead, Luke Wormall, Stefano Mini, Sam Graham, Larry Adeyemi, Mark Williams, Mark Glattback, Oliver Green, Conall McAteer and Jon Claxton. Pink Panthers: Jon Pople, Jon Mackie, Blair McMurray, Matt Martindale, Joe Spraggins, Joel Barlow, Jey Shanth, Mark Langford, Sam Czeres, Tyrone White, Raz Dalby, Adam Moore, Lewis Johnson, Raji Guna, Tom Walker, Eliot Tang, Hector Johnston and Phil Wormall.

Breast Cancer Campaign aims to beat breast cancer by funding innovative world-class research to understand how breast cancer develops, leading to improved diagnosis, treatment, prevention and cure. Currently it supports 104 research projects, worth over £16.1 million, in 38 centres of excellence across the UK and Ireland

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in the UK and accounts for nearly one in three of all cancers in women. In the UK, nearly 46,000 new cases of breast cancer are diagnosed each year – that’s 125 a day.

If you would like to contribute to Ricardo’s fundraising, please visit www.virginmoneygiving.com/ricardobraganza and donate what you can.

For more information about Breast Cancer Campaign visit www.breastcancercampaign.org.

I am currently feeling decidedly under-whelmed by a sporting summer that promised me the excitement of seeing sporting Gods at work and thrills and spills beyond my wildest dreams but for the most part – failed to deliver.

The 2010 World Cup – the quadrennial gathering of the greatest football talent on Planet Earth didn’t really live up to expectations for most people.

Surely the fact that the words “Vuvuzela” and “Jabulani” are now firmly planted in the mind of everyone who viewed the South African showpiece only backs that statement up.

We were talking about them because Wayne Rooney, Cristiano Ronaldo and to a lesser extent Lionel Messi gave us nothing else to marvel at.

For me the game of the tournament was the Ghana versus Uruguay quarter final.

Anyone not Uruguayan must have felt a tinge of sadness when Asamoah Gyan blasted the ball against the crossbar with the last kick of extra time.

By this point England were long gone of course albeit with a hint of controversy.

Having been ripped to shreds by a German side that was, amazingly, scoring goals like it was going out of fashion, the only crumb of comfort for England’s massive support was that Diego Maradona and Argentina met with a similar fate.

Surely Germany must win the whole thing now? Er, no.

The slow burning Spain expertly put them to the sword before surviving the Dutch assault in the final.

Reports of poor infrastructure, badly organised fan zones and widespread petty crime just add to the desire that this one should be put down to experience.

But now we had the summer staples to look forward to.

Well not really. This sporting apathy lark must be catching.

The first week of Wimbledon was the exception to the rule. Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer were both stretched to five sets in the opening days at SW19.

We also had the record breaker between John Isner and Nicolas Mahut.

I feel it would also be less than honest to ignore the delight felt across at least half the nation by the return of Anna Kournikova to the British summer.

Week two reverted to type.

Andy Murray had coasted through with but was swatted aside by a rampant Nadal. The improving Czech, Tomas Berdych ended the interest of numbers three and two in the world.

Surely he could give the world number one a decent game at the very least?

You know the rest.

Ok then. Chin up David and on to the British Grand Prix at Silverstone.

Perhaps more than most, this event encapsulated the summer of sport.

An exciting start with Mark Webber almost forcing Sebastian Vettel off the track before a sadly predictable procession to the chequered flag.

The high point of the day was Webber having a go at his own team. “Not bad for a number two driver!”

Come on St.Andrews. Save us.

The opening day of golf’s British Open Thursday belonged to Rory McIlroy who shot a majestic 63. The Old Course looked ready to welcome the second consecutive Northern Irish major winner.

That thought lasted less than a day as Mother Nature saw fit to sigh and blow Rory off course.

Tiger Woods, as ever, was prowling but going into Sunday it was the unfancied South African, Louis Oosthuizen who led the pack.

No way could he hold off the charge of Lee Westwood, Paul Casey et al.

It was never, EVER in doubt.

An easier final day at St. Andrews may never have been seen. On the birthday of Nelson Mandela, the South African kept his head as all around lost theirs.

What might have been this past couple of months?

So it’s down to you Mr Ryder to perk me up after one of the more disappointing summers of sport.

Don’t let me down.

Drinkaware Hoof It! Football Competition

So, after four weeks of the 2010 South Africa World Cup we now know who is going to be in Sunday’s final.  Holland will play Spain in what promises to be an exciting game of football.

To help you get off the sofa and practise the skills you’ve picked up from the pros,Buzzin Football are offering you the chance to win a Drinkaware Hoof It! Football.

Drinkaware is encouraging football fans to stay active and get ‘match fit’ throughout the summer by giving away 10,000 free Hoof It! footballs and you can get your hands on one of them right here.

What’s more, each ball has a unique code giving you the chance to win an Xbox 360 Elite console and FIFA World Cup 2010 game.

For more information on how to get ‘match fit’ this summer, go to www.drinkaware.co.uk/hoofit

To win a free Hoof It! football, simply answer the following question:

Who won the first World Cup tournament in 1930?

Send your entries to comps@buzzinmedia.co.uk with DrinkAware Football in the subject line (any other subject title will be not be entered) with your answer and your full address and contact telephone number.

This Buzzin Football DrinkAware competition ends on Sunday 11th July, 2010. The editor will randomly choose 10 winners.

The editor’s choice is final.

*The competition is only open to residents of England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales aged 18 or over, excluding employees of the promoter, their families or anyone else professionally associated with this competition.  Other terms and conditions apply

Through the inception of the Champions League – formerly the Champion Clubs Cup – in 1955, three future FIFA management officials, Ernst Thommen, Ottarino Barrasi and Sir Stanley Rous, developed a similar competition for European league members. It became the Europa League.

There have been many developments in the format for qualification, and ultimately the way the competition operates, since the 50’s, but the current system has existed for almost 15 years.

In 1972, the year in which the Europa League rules included two-legged finals, the winners were the English Tottenham Hotspur, who managed a 3-2 aggregate defeat of Wolverhampton Wanderers of the same nation, at home at White Hart Lane.

The last occurrence of a two-legged final saw Shalke dominate Internazionale in a penalty shootout to leave the San Siro stadium in Milan with a 4-1 success.

The current single match final format was conceived in 1998. The first winner of this new system was Internazionale, who achieved a 3-0 defeat over Lazio at the Parc Des Princes stadium in Paris. Last year Shakhtar Donetsk defeated Werder Bremen, 2-1.

Since the late 1970’s the competition, like the Champions League, has grown to include differing nations and clubs: Juventus, Internazionale and Liverpool have all achieved a total of 3 wins since the tournaments creation.

Since 2009 the Europa League has involved a total of 48 teams during the qualifying stage, dwindling to just 16 for the main legs, and like many international competitions, the league and the world renowned talent that takes part attract much attention from advertisers, sponsors and online betting companies, giving the tournament a high profile in the world arena.

The 2010 tournament has seen teams such as Liverpool, Fulham, Benfica, Athletico de Madrid, Valencia and Vfl Wolfsburg take to the pitch in the main legs in an effort to acquire the title.