Testing Results; Tracking Your Athletes Progress by Stephanie Shaw
[This is a guest blog by one of our Athletic Interns, Stephanie Shaw, an Exercise Science student from ECU]
Results. This is what athletes expect from a training protocol. Sure, there are temporary benefits from training such as stress relief and enjoyment, but ultimately athletes and coaches want results.
The best way to determine if an athlete is progressing is by testing them. Seems simple right? Well, there are a few things to take into consideration before testing an athlete. First, it is important to determine what needs to be tested. Some sports may have different biomechanical and physiological requirements than others. For example, a long distance runner does not need to necessarily be tested on their agility, while with a football player or soccer player this would be extremely important to incorporate. In an article from the, “Strength and Conditioning Journal”, they found that acceleration and max speed is very important to add to a testing battery for soccer players because it relates to the game. A soccer player sprints about every 90 seconds in a game, which in a 90 minute game this would be extremely important.
After determining what needs to be assessed it is then important to determine what test works best. There are many different tests out that can assess the same thing. To test strength, you can do the bench press or back squat. To test aerobic capacity, there is the 2-mile run for time, the beep test, the Yo-Yo Intermittent recovery test, and many more. To determine what test works best you have to again look at the sport and skill level of the athlete. You would not want someone who has never performed a back squat to do a 1RM back squat to test their strength. It would be better suited for them to do a squat jump test instead. The same goes for upper body. If there is an athlete who has never bench pressed before, you would not want them do a 1RM bench press to determine strength. Instead, a two minute pushup test would be recommended. Going back to the article from the “Strength and Conditioning Journal”, they found that for soccer players, the best way to assess speed is to have the athletes perform the 30 meter sprint test. This works best for soccer because 96% of sprints are 30 meters or less. It would then be unnecessary to have them perform a 40 meter test. This is why, here at Athletic Lab, the 30 meter sprint test is the number one method used to test max speed.
Once you have decided what needs to be tested and what test to use, it is then important to determine when the testing should be implemented. Testing should not fall within 2 days before or after competition due to fatigue affecting the match or the testing results. Lastly, make sure testing is assessed the same way each time. For example, when using the 1RM back squat there is a depth requirement. If for the first test you do not make sure they go at least parallel, but then the next time you test them more strictly then this could skew the accuracy of the results. It is important to make sure each test is implemented the same. After this has all been taken into consideration it is time for testing!!
