Wall Street Journal - Monday July 31 -06

[Guest guest]

There's a great article in the WSJ today written by on

Biofeedback and sports.

Here are some excerpts:

....Members of Italy's World Cup-winning soccer team have done it. A

starting quarterback in the NFL has tried it out. And so has Jordan

Kreuter, an 18-year-old golfer in North Carolina.

.....The thing they have in common: They've all turned to

neurofeedback, a technique that promises to help athletes reprogram

their brains so they can reach a zone of relaxed concentration during

clutch situations.

.....Long used to treat medical conditions such as attention deficit

hyperactivity disorder, epilepsy and dementia, it is beginning to

emerge as a tool for pro and amateur athletes alike -- with

neurofeedback machines even starting to show up at some local public

golf courses

....Neurofeedback's big claim to fame so far is its little-publicized

connection to this year's World Cup. In February, months before the

tournament started, some of Italy's best soccer players, including a

handful who would later play in the Cup, began spending much of their

practice time in a small room in Milan furnished with six luxury

leather recliners facing a glass wall.

.... " On the other side of the glass Bruno De Michelis, head of the

sports science lab for AC Milan, one of the country's top professional

teams, monitored a bank of six computer screens wired to a system made

by Thought Technology Ltd., a Canadian company. The screens showing

how each player's brain responded to stressful situations.