ORRECO, a company based in IT Sligo’s Innovation Centre which provides an applied bio marker (Blood and Saliva) testing service for elite athletes around the world, is part of the team behind athlete Fionnuala Britton’s huge success this week.
Fionnuala Britton made history on Sunday when she became the first woman to successfully retain her European Cross Country title in Budapest. She won two gold medals at the event, one in the Senior Women’s race and the other as a member of the overall winning team at the SPAR European Cross Country Championships.
Founded by sports scientist Dr Brian Moore, and consultant physician, Dr Andrew Hodgson in 2009, ORRECO provide biomarker analysis for World Class athletes to help them reach peak performance.
Members of the ORRECO team have worked with multiple World and Olympic Champions including the prestigious Nike Oregon Track Club, British Olympic Sailing Squad and athletes of the calibre of Padraig Harrington, Paula Radcliffe and Mo Farah.
The company’s advanced blood and saliva testing helps athletes reach peak performance, protects sports men and women from overtraining syndrome and helps reduce the number of training days lost to illness and infection. Fionnuala Britton and her coach Chris Jones have paid tribute to the support provided by ORRECO; “Regular blood tests enable me to target any issues I have,” Fionnuala is quoted as saying on the company website. “It plays an essential role in reducing my chances of illness, increasing recovery and optimising performance. Recovery is one of the most important priorities, and through the monitoring of my blood work this has helped aid the application of recovery strategies.”
“If athletes are to looking to progress then it should be with the type of quality and expertise available from ORRECO,” Chris Jones commented. “They give confidence to the coaching process and also take on the responsibility of educating coaches and athletes, influencing a much better understanding of athlete peak performance and health management.”
The ORRECO team includes physiologists, medical doctors, biomedical scientists, biostatisticians, and clinical and performance nutritionists. A key part of the service is an early warning signal for athletes who may be in danger of over-training. “Elite athletes obviously have to train hard to improve, but there is a risk that in search of improvement that they may over-train. By cross referencing biomarker results with performance tests we can help identify signs that they are over-reaching before becoming excessively fatigued, Ill or injured,” explained Dr Moore.
“We were delighted, but not surprised, to see Fionnuala produce this stunning performance in Budapest, retaining her European Cross Country Championship,” he said. “Chris is widely acknowledged as a truly world class coach and when his skill-set is allied with Fionnuala’s prodigious talent, dedication and hard work, you have a winning combination. It is a privilege to be a part of their support team”.
While based at IT Sligo’s Innovation Centre, the company has partner analysis sites around the world, and their international team of physiologists, physicians, performance and clinical nutritionists support athletes training in bases around the world including Cape Town, Johannesburg, London, Sydney, Brisbane, Oregon, Florida and San Francisco.
ORRECO came through Enterprise Ireland’s Propel Programme with the support of the Innovation Centre at IT Sligo.
To find out more about ORRECO see http://orreco.com/
To watch a video about their system see https://vimeo.com/41485500