The surf was up at ACSEP 2017

Let the koalas sleep — you won’t be doing much of that if you attend an ACSEP conference

One of the highlights of my 2016 was my first visit to the Australasian College of Sport and Exercise Physicians (ACSEP) annual meeting.  I wrote about the experience in several of these CJSM blog posts.

ACSEP is one of CJSM’s affiliated societies, and we greatly value our relationship with the college.  Two of our Associate Editors are members of the college: Hamish Osborne (NZ) and Steve Reid (AUS).

On a personal note, I also greatly valued the experience of attending the meeting. The venue (Surfer’s Paradise) was stunning — just the ticket for someone muddling through a Northern Hemisphere winter.  And the proceedings themselves — well, they were little short of perfect.  From the educational sessions to the food and social events — first class, all the way.

ACSEP 2016 was, without a doubt, one of the best sports medicine conferences I have ever attended.

I couldn’t make the 2017 edition, which also took place in Surfer’s Paradise. What was my misfortune turned out to have a pleasant side-effect, as Dr. Osborne was in attendance, and he graciously penned this letter giving an overview of the proceedings:

____________________________________________________

ACSEP has been and gone and my promised blog post is now a thank you to all those who attended clearly our biggest but also our best-ever annual scientific conference. I arrived early, actually before most registrars as it turned out, to meet and greet and enjoy the excellent presentations from our new intake of trainees. The bar is going up and up. Looking forward to increasing research contributions from this group as they come through.

Hi hon, really busy at the ACSEP meeting

The first afternoon of the conference was up there with perhaps the best series of 4 keynotes on SEM that I have ever heard. Oh wait, actually the conference kicked off in the morning, as you would expect with a choice of Yoga on the Beach (did I mention we were back in Surfers Paradise), HIIT, Surfing lessons, Tennis and the biggest golf day ever. I’m not sure whether our main man Corey Cunningham, fellow and conference co-ordinator extraordinaire rigged it to win, or as he said, “he was the only one to play to his handicap.”

Back to that first afternoon Prof David Hunter from Sydney University, Rheumatologist and world expert on Osteoarthritis, Prof Mark Batt, University of Nottingham, Sport and OA links (or not), Prof Martin Schwellnus, University of Pretoria, Exercise Cramps and the final smack down – Prof Daniel Galvão and his amazing tour through the world of Exercise as a Synergistic Treatment for Cancer. I could write for pages on that afternoon…

Yours truly, and President Adam Castricum started Saturday morning with some important college updates on our new code of ethical conduct and behaviour, so important to have this updated and to be leading in this area to go with our other key documents e.g. the ACSEP Position Statement on Stem Cells in SEM. Adam kicked off the search for our 5 key words to represent our culture; little did he know that in the evening at the grand gala awards presentation of new fellows to the college that FIBA Hall of Famer, the one and only Michelle Timms, would discuss the culture they invented prior to winning Australia’s first team Olympic medal:  the Women’s Basketball Bronze in Atlanta 1996. Culture is really important in our college – Jim will confirm this and I’m sure he wishes he could have been back here this year.

Now, watch this space – we are back on the Gold Coast, Surfers Paradise again NEXT YEAR – yes going for the triple – it’s Commonwealth Games year on the Gold Coast and we are going for Gold with our Commonwealth Games Congress. Want to warm up in February?  Get away from a European/North American winter?   We are going to be even bigger and better, so come Down Under and find out.

Before then hoping to see you all in Mont-Tremblant (p.s. make sure you accept all my abstracts).

Best wishes

Yours in SEM

Hamish

___________________________________________________

Thanks Hamish.  Surfing lessons on the beach?  I missed that?!  Aargh…..

I can confirm:  the culture of the college, ACSEP, is exemplary. A model for organizations including the SEM ones to which I belong:  American Medical Society for Sports Medicine (AMSSM) and the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM).

I look forward to seeing Hamish and others (perhaps you, the reader?) at Mt. Temblant June 7 – 10:  the location of the annual meeting of the Canadian Academy of Sport and Exercise Medicine (CASEM).  That is another special SEM conference you should have circled on your calendar.