Sport and Exercise Sciences

All our staff have higher education teaching qualifications and 100% of their research was rated as world leading or internationally recognised in the 2021 Research Excellence Framework. This places us 5th in the UK for all Sport Science departments. This means that staff are not only leading researchers, but many are also applied practitioners working with some of the world’s leading athletes and teams. This is a rare combination. It ensures that students benefit from the latest perspectives from both the research labs and from the applied world of exercise and high-performance sport.

All of our programmes offer placement opportunities to gain work experience, including placement years. These opportunities are closely linked to the unique high calibre professional research links associated with our staff e.g., UK Sport, Manchester City FC , Liverpool FC, RAF, England and Wales Cricket Board, NHS. To gain a placement in these leading organisations is facilitated by our staff unique links.

Our class sizes mean all students have regular practical sessions in our £1 Million teaching lab right from Year 1. This ensures you can confidently and competently use testing equipment, so you stand out for the competition in the world of work.

All our programmes break from the traditional compartmentalised teaching models adopted by many other sport and exercise departments. We achieve this by featuring cutting-edge modules across all years that are dedicated to bringing the psychology, physiology and human movement disciplines together. Modules such as “Psychophysiology of Sport and Exercise” and “Applied Psychophysiology: How to Monitor and Enhance Performance” cover the latest psychophysiological and neuroscientific research in sport and exercise and include practical experience so students can learn first-hand how what is happening in the mind can impact the body (and vice-versa). This interdisciplinary way of thinking is driving many of the latest trends in the field (e.g., the explosion of bioapps for monitoring stress levels, recovery, brain readiness etc) and will set-up graduates to apply modern interdisciplinary knowledge and skills in their future careers.

Many Sport and Exercise Science graduates pursue careers in teaching, coaching, physiotherapy – our course lays a solid foundation for careers in these domains. BUT, in addition to producing graduates for these traditional career paths, our programmes have also produced a long line of graduates who have progressed into highly successful academic careers (i.e., developed into the next generation of world-leading sport and exercise scientists). In fact, most of our current lecturers and Professors are Bangor graduates! Our course has also produced a long line of graduates who have become successful applied practitioners for high-profile organisations (e.g., for Premier League football teams, international cricket teams, sport governing bodies, NHS).

Unusually for such a high ranked sport science department, all your facilities are easily accessible in one space. Our teaching and lab buildings are all located on the Normal Site Campus helping to reduce your travel time and create a great community working and learning environment.

This is the access hub to the departments Physical Activity and Well-Being centre, together with the onsite leisure facilities, including two sports halls and a small strength and conditioning space.

You are now in the main corridor of the PAWB centre, where students have access to three separate teaching and research labs.

Here is where you get direct practical experience using the most up-to-date sport and exercise science equipment. This regular hands-on experience helps set us apart from other top ranked sport science departments. You’ll get real world practical experience using the equipment in the same way the department does when working with organisations to investigate neuroscience, psychophysiology, sport psychology, personality, and physiology to answer future employers’ questions and have real impact. For example, how to measure exercise behaviour change? How to accurately measure patients, potential talent, and world class athletes’ physiology to help drive positive change for them? Or how to design and implement individualised pressure training programmes for high performance teams? Incidentally, the departments individualised pressure training programme was recently implemented with the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) and directly helped the England Men’s teams’ win the World Cup.

It is both important for all students to have practical hands on experience and that we continue to sit in the UK’s top 5 list for Sport Science departments, the PAWB centre houses a number of separate teaching and research spaces. Here is one specifically designed for health, pre- and rehab, and other aspects of medical based application of sport science knowledge.

In this teaching and research lab, the PAWB centre has a suite of S&C equipment, from free weights right through to treadmills that can work up to speeds faster than humans can typically run. The use cases for this is vast from simple warm ups to high performance testing.

All the facilities are just a short walk apart and often just a quick hop down a corridor.

On site we have two sports halls. In this, the smaller of the two, students and clubs can access the space for a variety of activities.

This is the larger of the two on site sports halls and contains full size basketball, 5 a side football, and netball courts, together with 4 badminton courts. This is used by students both for recreation activities, but also directly in modules and classes for practical sessions and research purposes.

Everything is designed with your studies in mind. We minimise travel challenges by housing your facilities in a simple to access space. This is the main Sport Science building where you can access staff offices, lecture theatres, more labs, together with a fantastic view of the Menai Straits!

This is the main entrance of the George building. As a grade II listed building you can see it has a lot more character and soul than the typically new glass fronted buildings you’ll encounter in other institutions.

On this wing of the George Building you can access the two main teaching and lecture spaces.

In this lecture theatre, you’ll experience smaller groups teaching and seminars. These enable you to really develop your learning and knowledge and offer a smaller forum where discussion and challenge take place.

This is the departments main lecture hall. This is where you’ll experience the traditional teaching method of a university and interact with the staff to gain the core aspects of your sport and exercise science degree.

The George building is split over several levels. Once up the stairs, you can access the staff offices and additional research and teaching labs.

The staff offices are in the same building as your lectures and you won’t need a special card or code to access them. This means that you can schedule tutorials and discuss your studies directly with staff in a safe and friendly environment and in ad doc basis.

The second floor houses another series of research and teaching labs where you have further access to world class equipment.

In the first of the George building physiology labs, you’ll find hundreds of pieces of equipment that are used for a multitude of purposes from taking and analysing blood through to manipulating exercise and performance environments. The latter can be completed in this lab via the use of the environmental chamber where we can manipulate both room temperature (extreme heat to extreme cold) and humidity. This helps investigate how extreme environments impact of human performance: e.g., Firefighters, athletes, rescue, and military personnel.

Similar to the first of the two physiology labs in the George building, the octagonal house hundreds of pieces of equipment including an altitude (hypoxia) chamber.

Its just a short hop outside, the Padarn labs and teaching spaces, where you’ll find the biochemistry, motion analysis, psychology, and motor control labs.

In Padarns biochemistry and prep labs you’ll have access to all the equipment necessary for collecting and analysing the bodies' ‘chemistry’. Here you can collect and analyse everything from hair samples through to blood, muscle tissue, and the bodies cell structure.

This is an example of one of our 7 separate psychology and psychomotor control labs. In these you have access to equipment at your fingertips including multiple electroencephalogram (EEG) and electrophysiology (ERP), eye tracking, manipulandum’s, graphics tablets, balance boards and even Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) and brain simulation. All these will enable you to investigate and further your knowledge of sport and exercise science to a level that will stand you apart when you enter the work place.

In the motion analysis lab, you’ll have access to both a 12 camera Vicon passive tracking system and an Optotrac active marker tracking system performance. Here you can really get to grips with developing your understanding of human movement to aid in your skill development surrounding performance analysis from the sports, health, and wider high-performance sectors.

In addition to the excellent facilities on the Normal site, just 5 minutes walk located between Telford’s famous Menai suspension bridge and Stephenson’s noted and picturesque original railway bridge - Britannia - you’ll have access to Treborth. This houses flood lit 4G pitches, traditional grass pitches (football, rugby, hockey, even American football) together with a full size athletics running track. Whist you can access these facilities for general sport and leisure, you’ll also experience practical classes here where you can start to put what you learn the lecture theatre into the real-world setting.