Emily has spent the past decade building and refining a sports science model within a relatively small department, working primarily with men’s and women’s soccer and volleyball. Alongside her role at Marquette, she also contributes to U.S. Soccer in a high-performance capacity.

In this conversation, we explore one of the most pressing challenges in applied sports science: how do you simplify complex data streams so they become actionable for coaches and meaningful for athletes?

From acute:chronic workload ratios and GPS monitoring to return-to-play frameworks and Power BI dashboards, Emily shares how she transformed “expensive toys” into effective performance tools.

She discusses the importance of visualisation, collaboration with data engineers, humility in decision-making, and why the “eyeball test” still matters in a world driven by wearables and AI.

For practitioners working in elite sport, or those building systems within constrained environments, this episode offers practical insight into making sports science more impactful, not just more complex.

In this episode you will learn:

• How to simplify GPS and workload data for real-world application
• Why acute:chronic workload ratios are a framework — not a solution
• How to build effective data visualisations that coaches actually use
• The difference between “expensive toys” and performance tools
• How to structure phased return-to-play models with clear definitions
• Why collaboration with data engineers and academics can transform departments
• How to educate athletes in an era of AI, social media and misinformation
• Why patience and long-term development still matter
• How to adapt sports science systems in the transfer-portal era
• Why relationships remain more important than technology

About Emily Jacobson
Emily Jacobson is the Assistant Director of Sports Performance at Marquette University, where she has worked for the past 10 seasons. A former Marquette women’s soccer student-athlete, she now oversees sports science and performance systems across multiple programmes, with a particular focus on soccer and volleyball.

She has helped develop load monitoring models, return-to-play protocols and data visualisation systems that integrate GPS, velocity-based training, force plates, motion capture and body composition analysis.

In addition to her work at Marquette, Emily serves as a network employee within U.S. Soccer’s high-performance department.

Her approach combines applied performance coaching, collaborative analytics, and a strong emphasis on education and athlete relationships.

FREE 7d SCIENCE FOR SPORT ACADEMY TRIAL

SIGN UP NOW: https://bit.ly/SFSepisode241

​ Learn Quicker & More Effectively
​ Optimise Your Athletes' Recovery
​ Position Yourself As An Expert To Your Athletes And Naturally Improve Buy-In
​ Reduce Your Athletes' Injury Ratese
​ Save 100's Of Dollars A Year That Would Otherwise Be Spent On Books, Courses And More
​ Improve Your Athletes' Performance
​ Advance Forward In Your Career, Allowing You To Earn More Money And Work With Elite-Level Athletes
​ Save Yourself The Stress & Worry Of Constantly Trying To Stay Up-To-Date With Sports Science Research

Specifically Arian will be looking at:

• Importance of data visualisation
• How best communicate data
• Examples of how he communicates data

About Arian:

"Arian is a 1st Team Sport Scientist & Data Analyst for Wolverhampton Wanderers FC. He holds a Masters Degree in Exercise Physiology, as well as appropriate Data Science & Visualisation certification. Specialising in Sports Performance Data, he has been able to transform the physical data processes in his role in order to answer performance questions and identify actionable insights. Also through his business ‘Data In Sport’, he has worked with several organisations around the world. Transforming and designing their data processes and visualisations, has led to a fluid approach towards finding solutions found in different datasets. This includes visualising their data in a bespoke fashion, and providing quality insights for these practitioners."

LinkedIn: Arian Forouhandeh
Twitter: ArianF14
Instagram: DataInSport
Website: www.datainsport.com

Power Bi for Sports 📊 (scienceforsport.com)

Nominate future podcast guests here!

If you want to hear from a particular person on a particular topic, let us know! Hit the link below and we'll see what we can whip up for you.

https://www.scienceforsport.com/nominate/

FREE 7d COACH ACADEMY TRIAL

SIGN UP NOW:

https://bit.ly/sfsepisode179

JOIN THE SCIENCE FOR SPORT TEAM:

https://www.scienceforsport.com/join-our-team/

​ Learn Quicker & More Effectively, Freeing Up Time To Spend With Friends And Family
​ Optimise Your Athletes' Recovery
​ Position Yourself As An Expert To Your Athletes And Naturally Improve Buy-In
​ Reduce Your Athletes' Injury Ratese
​ Save 100's Of Dollars A Year That Would Otherwise Be Spent On Books, Courses And More
​ Improve Your Athletes' Performance
​ Advance Forward In Your Career, Allowing You To Earn More Money And Work With Elite-Level Athletes
​ Save Yourself The Stress & Worry Of Constantly Trying To Stay Up-To-Date With Sports Science Research

🔔 Subscribe to the podcast on your favourite platform

• Apple Podcasts
• Google Podcasts
• Spotify
• Stitcher