Recent trends suggest growing application of sports science programs within United States-based sport organizations. Discussion is necessary to illuminate several ways sports scientist (SS) roles may be leveraged to enhance athlete and coach performance and enable support of knowledge-related tasks within and across organizations and throughout sports systems. Here we provide an overview of a variety of organizational arrangements for full-time through part-time SS roles, and some available best practices that support them—including the high-performance manager role. In addition, we discuss the misapplication of SS roles and highlight US-centric challenges in establishing sports science research programs.

This brief opinion-based editorial addresses what the authors perceive to be a fundamental issue in the application of sport science, and these issues are reflected by the question “Are you doing any sport science?” As sport science has grown within the United States, organizational sport science budgets have grown, with increasing interest in developing various sport science initiatives. While it is indeed an exciting time for sport science, the authors suggest that, too often, sport science pursuits are driven by commercially available technologies and viewed as an “add-on” instead of pursuing an integrated systematic approach to informing the training process.

Sport scientist roles are becoming more common in U.S. professional and collegiate sport. Despite the recent growth in opportunities, discussion is necessary to elucidate differences between sport scientist specialties and other roles common within the integrated support team and across the sport industry. In addition, guidance is necessary to show how sport scientists serving in academic appointments may be involved in sport organizations and influence sport systems. This information may be used: (a) to help employers to conceptualize roles and design job descriptions and (b) to help governing organizations and universities establish training programs for sport scientists.

A variety of sport organizations employ sport scientists (SSs) in a range of capacities to support team operations, whereas universities employ SSs in academic (teaching and research), consulting, and support roles. Despite the growth in professional opportunities in the United States over the last few decades, little discussion has occurred to identify best practices in developing SSs. Here, we identify several examples of professional development pathways used by overseas organizations that govern SS roles and highlight key features of existing U.S.-based sport support role pathways. This information can be used to develop, implement, and evaluate professional training of SSs, along with shaping SS training programs in the U.S.

Ideally an athlete would continue to improve performance indefinitely over time, however improvement slows as the athlete approaches their genetic limits. Measuring performance is complex—performance may be temporarily depressed following aggressive training for multiple reasons, physiological and psychosocial. This reality may be vexing to the strength and conditioning coach, who, as a service provider, must answer to sport coaches about an athlete’s progress. Recently an evaluation mechanism for strength and conditioning coaches was proposed, in part to help coaches establish their effectiveness within the organization. Without formal guidance and realistic expectations, if an athlete is not bigger, leaner, stronger, etc. as a result of training within a specified timeframe, blame is often placed upon the strength and conditioning coach. The purpose of this article is to explore possible causes of what may be perceived as athlete non-responses to training and to provide guidance for the coach on how to handle those issues within their domain. A process of investigation is recommended, along with resources to assist coaches as they consider a broad range of issues, including enhancing existing testing methods, improving athlete behaviors, and adjusting processes designed to bring about performance improvement.