The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of plyometric training on sand and wooden parquet training surfaces on the physical performance parameters of young male basketball players. Twelve well-trained young male basketball players with age 17.58±0.5 years, body mass 87.73±9.82 kg, and height 193.75±7.02 cm were voluntarily involved in the study. All participants were grouped randomly as sand and wooden training groups. A six-week plyometric training programme was performed on the sand and wooden parquet surfaces. Anthropometric measurements and physical performance tests; vertical and standing long jump, box agility, and 30m sprint tests were performed. Data were collected before and after six weeks of plyometric training and were analysed using ANCOVA. The results indicated that the plyometric training programme significantly improved jumping, agility and 30m sprint performance for both groups. Significant differences were found between the post-test mean values of two groups in the box-drill agility and 30m sprint test scores (p < .05). The results of this study suggest that while the plyometric training performed on a wooden or sand surface does not cause a different effect on the improvement of jumping performance, plyometric training on the sand surface may be a more effective training surface to improve the agility and sprint performance of young players.

No abstract

Background and Study Aim. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of metabolic stress created by 6-week football training applied in the pre-season period on circulation and hematological parameters of well-trained male football players.  Material and Methods. Fourteen male football players who competed in the U19 category of a football team in Turkish Football Super League participated in the study voluntarily. In the study, players’ systolic - diastolic blood pressures and resting heart rates were measured and their blood samples were taken before and after the 6-week training period. Laboratory analysis was made to determine counts and concentration percentage of erythrocyte, leukocyte, and platelet sub-parameters. Wilcoxon Signed-Rank test was performed to determine the difference between pre and post measurements. Results. Our findings indicated that baseline mean values of lymphocyte, mean cell hemoglobin, and mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration were significantly higher than posttest mean values. The mean of diastolic blood pressure and resting heart rate measured before the preseason training camp were lower than their posttest mean values (p > .05). Conclusion. It is thought that the decrease in the mean values of diastolic blood pressure and resting heart rate caused by the effect of regular training during the preseason training period, while the increase in the mean values of mean cell haemoglobin and mean corpuscular haemoglobin concentration caused by the increased oxygen demand of the metabolism during the training period.  

The purpose of current study was to investigate the hematology parameters of male athletes who had exercised regularly for five years and sedentary male university students. Material: The sample consisted of 18 well-trained and 18 sedentary male university students aged between 20 and 22 years old. The peripheral fasting blood samples were collected from each participant. Laboratory analysis was made to determine the red and white blood cells counts and their concentration percentage. Results: The means of white blood cell, lymphocyte, monocyte counts, and lymphocyte and monocyte percentages were significantly lower in the well-trained group while the means of hemoglobin count, mean cell hemoglobin, red blood cell distribution width were significantly lower in sedentary group (p > .05). However, no statistically significant difference between groups was found in red blood cell counts, granulocyte counts, and granulocyte percentages (p > .05). Conclusions: Our findings show that athletes participating in the long-term regular exercise have the high level of the concentration of red blood cells subtypes and the low level of the concentration of white blood cells subtypes when compared to their sedentary peers. Because their hematologic values remain within the reference range for healthy people, these differences do not pose any serious clinical problems for athletes. The high RBC and low WBC subtypes values of athletes may be explained by chronic adaptation to long-term exercise.

Background and Study Aim. Health literacy is the ability to access health information, understand, evaluate and apply health information. The health literacy of athletes may be determinant in the understanding of the COVID-19 pandemic process and in the level of the impact of this health-related anxiety factor. Therefore, the aim of this study is to examine whether there is a relationship between college athletes' COVID-19 anxiety levels and their health literacy levels during the COVID-19 pandemic. Material and Methods. College athletes between the ages of 18 and 32 participated in the study and the average age was 24.2. A total of 234 elite collage athletes participated in the study. 133 of the participants were males and 101 were females. COVID-19 Anxiety Scale was used to determine the COVID-19 anxiety states and Health Literacy index was used to the level of health literacy of the participants in the COVID-19 pandemic process. Pearson correlation analysis and stepwise regression analysis were performed for statistical analyses. Significance level in analysis has been accepted as p. < 05. Results. Our findings revealed that there were significant relationships between elite athletes' health literacy sub-dimension scores and COVID-anxiety level. In addition, it was determined that access to information and understanding information sub-dimensions from health literacy sub-dimensions predicted elite college athletes’ the COVID-19 anxiety level at 21.2%. As a result, elite college athletes had low levels of anxiety against COVID-19, and this situation associated with their high level of health literacy. Conclusions. The increase of elite college athletes' the level of health literacy will decrease their anxiety levels. It will be beneficial to implement training programs that can increase their health literacy levels in order to reduce the impact of the unexpected health crisis due to COVID-19, especially the anxiety levels of college athletes.