Team Spirit

Team players can tolerate twice as much pain as those who work alone, according to recent research that throws fresh light on some of the most surprising achievements in sports history.
Researchersat Oxbridge University have found that members of its rowing team had a greater ability to resist pain –or “pain threshold”– after training together than when they performed the same exercisesindividually.
Working as a group stimulates the production of endorphins, a feel-good chemical released in the brain that is a temporary painkiller.
This effect might have played a part in anextraordinary football final between Manchester City and Birmingham in 1956. The City goalkeeper broke his neck after diving for the ball, but went on to make a series of crucial saves to help his team win thegame 3-1.
The Oxbridge researchers speculate that a similar sudden rise of endorphins might be the cause of the feel-good sensations people experience when they dance together, play team sports ortake part in religious rituals.
They made a study that involved twelve male rowers. In the first part of the experiment, two teams of six rowed continuously for 45 minutes in the gym. Their rowingmachines were linked up to create a “virtual boat” that demanded that they all row in synchrony. In the next training session, the rowers performed the same exercise as individuals, unobserved by othersin the team. Between five and ten minutes after each training session, the investigators measured the rowers’ pain thresholds by putting a blood pressure cuff around the arm and inflating it until itbecame uncomfortably painful. Then they measured the release of endorphins in the blood system.
The researchers say that, compared with training alone, group training significantly increases thepain threshold: “We can eliminate the possibility that this effect might have been due to elevated work rates, because the rowers’ power output was not significantly different.” They also added: “What...