Vision expert has Olympic success in her sights

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Athletes preparing for the Beijing Olympics and beyond will be honing a new type of training at Bisham Abbey.

The British Olympic Association (BOA) has joined forces with Johnson & Johnson to enlist South African Dr Sherylle Calder, a visual performance skills consultant, to improve their visual skills and in turn enhance performance.

Her work goes beyond a straight -forward sight test and even athletes with 20:20 vision can improve on the way they see objects and how and what they focus on.

It was Sir Clive Woodward, who is now the director of Elite Performance for the BOA who headhunted Dr Calder to work with Team GB after she helped his 2003 England Rugby Team to World Cup victory in 2003.

Sir Clive said: "An athlete with good visual memory alwasy seems to be in the right place at the right time and of course nothing happens in sport until the eye tells the body what to do.
"Having worked with Sherylle at England Rugby, I can see the difference vision training made to the team."

Heptathlete Kelly Sotherton and badminton mixed doubles stars Gail Emms and Nathan Robertson have already started training with Dr Calder.
She will initially be focusing on Judo, boxing and tennis.

Watch our video report on the Bisham Abbey press launch for Dr Calder here.