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New Zealand versus the United States in the women’s Cup Final during the 2024 Cape Town 7s at DHL Stadium on Sunday, Dec 8, 2024 in Cape Town, South Africa. Photo by Alex Ho / World Rugby

The USA Rugby Women’s Eagles Sevens are preparing for the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles with support from UC San Diego’s Wu Tsai Human Performance Alliance.

Led by Alliance Innovation Hub director Samuel Ward and project scientist Swithin Razu, the partnership brings together coaches, medical staff, and scientists to understand how these athletes move, train, and recover across a demanding international competition calendar.

The UC San Diego team helps support the optimization of the USA Rugby’s athlete management system, bringing training, match, and wellness data into one place where coaches and medical staff can use it. The team also supports the national combine, helping to standardize the testing and interpret the results to identify and develop emerging talent. Additional assessments, such as DEXA body composition scans and urine testing, track hydration and other physiological markers over time, are being integrated by the Alliance researchers and USA Rugby staff to build a clearer picture of what each player needs to perform at her best.

Photo by Alex Ho / World Rugby

Together, USA Rugby and UC San Diego are building a performance blueprint aimed at supporting this Olympic cycle and raising the bar for women’s sport in the United States.

Leadership from the Wu Tsai Human Performance Alliance and the Joe and Clara Tsai Foundation recently met with the USA Women’s Eagles Sevens rugby team on the field in San Diego. The visit provided an insider look at the team’s training regimen, featuring a live practice session, player meet-and-greet, and presentations from Head Coach Emilie Bydwell, her coaching staff, and UC San Diego Alliance researchers embedded within USA Rugby. Discussions focused on ongoing research collaborations and novel training strategies designed to optimize athlete performance and maintain the team’s medal-winning momentum heading into the 2028 Olympic Games.

Alliance leadership visit to watch a USA Rugby Women’s Eagles Sevens practice. Image credit: Jennifer Stowe.