Importance, Reliability, and Usefulness of Acceleration Measures in Team Sports

Abstract

Delaney, JA, Cummins, CJ, Thornton, HR, and Duthie, GM. Importance, reliability and usefulness of acceleration measures in team sports. J Strength Cond Res 32(12): 3494-3502, 2018-The ability to accelerate, decelerate, and change direction efficiently is imperative to successful team sports performance. Traditional intensity-based thresholds for acceleration and deceleration may be inappropriate for time-series data and have been shown to exhibit poor reliability, suggesting other techniques may be preferable. This study assessed movement data from one professional rugby league team throughout 2 full seasons and 1 preseason period. Using both 5 and 10 Hz global positioning systems (GPS) units, a range of acceleration-based variables were evaluated for their interunit reliability, ability to discriminate between positions, and associations with perceived muscle soreness. The reliability of 5 Hz global positioning systems for measuring acceleration and deceleration ranged from good to poor (CV = 3.7-27.1%), with the exception of high-intensity deceleration efforts (CV = 11.1-11.8%), the 10 Hz units exhibited moderate-to-good interunit reliability (CV = 1.2-6.9%). Reliability of average metrics (average acceleration/deceleration, average acceleration, and average deceleration) ranged from good to moderate (CV = 1.2-6.5%). Substantial differences were detected between positions using time spent accelerating and decelerating for all magnitudes, but these differences were less clear when considering the count or distance above acceleration/deceleration thresholds. All average metrics detected substantial differences between positions. All measures were similarly related to perceived muscle soreness, with the exception of high-intensity acceleration and deceleration counts. This study has proposed that averaging the acceleration/deceleration demands over an activity may be a more appropriate method compared with threshold-based methods, because a greater reliability between units, while not sacrificing sensitivity to within-subject and between-subject changes.

Comparing external total load, acceleration and deceleration outputs in elite basketball players across positions during match play

“…After collection, all the match data were analysed with a software designed to provide objective measures of movement patterns and training load (Viper 2.6.0.0 Software). As in previous studies (Aughey, 2011), the occurrences of moderate accelerations/decelerations (< 3 m•s -2 ) and maximal accelerations/ decelerations (> 3 m•s -2 ) were recorded (Delaney, Cummins, Thornton, & Duthie, 2017). Accelerations and decelerations in each band were calculated by identifying sudden increases/decreases in speed and continued increasing/decreasing for at least 0.5 s. To be recognized as an acceleration/deceleration, the increases/decreases in speed identified must be greater than or equal to the user-defined value for moderate and maximal bands.…”

Validity of an ultra-wideband local positioning system to measure locomotion in indoor sports

“…While the validity of Clearsky to measure distance, speed and acceleration may be considered acceptable for applications in indoor sport settings, the differences between Clearsky and Vicon for mean and peak deceleration may appear excessive at a first analysis. However, it is important to note that, from a practical perspective, practitioners may be more inclined to report acceleration and deceleration efforts either as single efforts over a longer sampling period, such as 0.2 or 0.3s (Aughey, 2011) or as average values over longer phases of a game or training session (Delaney, Cummins, Thornton, & Duthie, 2017;Delaney et al, 2016). In both cases, the error associated with these variables may be greatly reduced (Varley, Jaspers, Helsen, & Malone, 2017), making them suitable to reflect human locomotion in sport.…”

Physical demands of playing position within English Premier League academy soccer

“…Osgnach et al (2009) suggest accelerations are of greater energy cost than constant speed movements. In addition, an athlete's ability to accelerate is suggested to contribute to on-field performance (Delaney et al, 2017). Focusing specifically upon high-speed metrics would result in accelerations occurring at low absolute speeds not being quantified (Akenhead et al, 2013;Guadino et al, 2010).…”