- Sport Science Snag
- Posts
- 🎾 Prolonged Tennis Impacts Muscle Activity
🎾 Prolonged Tennis Impacts Muscle Activity
PLUS: VR Enhances Relay Athletes’ Anticipation Skills
Haresh Suppiah
October 28, 2024 • Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes
Welcome, science enthusiasts.
In today’s edition:
How prolonged tennis playing affects lower limb muscle activity.
Virtual reality for anticipating skills in 4 x 100 m relay athletes.
Effects of curling on friction.
Heart responses in 100-mile endurance runs.
Hormonal changes before competitions.
Menstrual phase impact on football match running.
Coaching youth fencing footwork.
and several more…
FEATURED ARTICLES 🌭
Key finding:
Prolonged tennis play decreases lower limb muscle activation during serves, especially the first serve, despite unchanged performance metrics.
How they did it:
Methodology: Ten male competitive tennis players performed serves before and after a 3-hour tennis match, with electromyographic (EMG) activity recorded from key lower limb muscles and maximum ball velocity measured.
Results: EMG amplitude decreased significantly in the vastus lateralis, gastrocnemius lateralis, and soleus muscles of the left leg as well as the vastus lateralis of the right leg, especially during first serves, which showed reductions ranging from -10% to -40%.
Innovation: The study utilized real-time EMG monitoring to assess muscle activity changes in relation to fatigue during actual match play scenarios, rather than simulated conditions.
Application: Despite unchanged ball velocity and peak forces throughout the match, the findings suggest that players may develop compensatory activation patterns in response to fatigue, informing training approaches
Why it matters:
Understanding how prolonged tennis playing affects lower limb muscle activation during serves gives coaches and athletes crucial insights into developing tailored conditioning programs, ensuring that serve technique remains sharp—because nobody wants their ace to turn into an error when fatigue hits!
Key finding:
Virtual reality reveals that top-level relay athletes anticipate starts by minimizing variability in their motor responses.
How they did it:
Methodology: Nineteen athletes from the French national teams participated in a virtual reality experiment where they initiated their run based on the timing of a digital partner’s motion.
Results: Athletes displayed a mean absolute error of 82 ms in foot lift timing, indicating a high level of coordination under task constraints, with significant inter-individual variability in initiation times.
Events Timing: Key events—wave initiation, gaze release, and foot lift—occurred at distinct average times before the partner reached a go-mark, showing a perceptual-motor dialogue guiding their actions.
Innovations: The study introduced virtual reality as a tool for detailed analysis of motor behaviors and anticipation skills, paving the way for personalized training protocols.
Analysis: Findings highlight the necessity of individualized strategies in elite athletes, emphasizing how different visual focus strategies can affect performance outcomes.
Why it matters:
By using virtual reality to analyze the nuanced anticipation skills of elite 4x100m relay athletes, this research equips coaches with essential insights for crafting personalized training programs that enhance timing precision and coordination, ultimately boosting team performance where every millisecond counts. The findings underscore the importance of refining perceptual-motor strategies, helping athletes minimize variability and optimize their race starts—because in relays, it’s not just about running fast; it’s about running smart too.
QUICK BITES 🍤
Biomechanics
-Asymmetric sweeping significantly enhances curling control with a 95% reliability for improving stone trajectory.
Female Athlete
-Match running performance in female footballers is highest during the mid-late follicular phase of the menstrual cycle.
Sport and Society
-Collegiate esports programs are increasingly integrating fan labor, recognizing its vital role in enhancing community and support.
Sport Management
-Brazil’s federal universities provide some academic and sports support for student-athletes, but do not fully implement a holistic model.
Sport Physiology
-Ultramarathon running does not increase arterial stiffness but significantly lowers blood pressure while causing muscle damage.
-Significant hormonal changes during competition preparation in physique athletes indicate physiological stress and impact muscle strength and mood.
Sport Psychology
-Self-confrontation interviews may enhance elite athletes’ performance by improving their reflective and pre-reflective awareness.
Youth Athlete
-AI-driven training improves fencing footwork efficiency for adolescents, reducing their training burden and enhancing performance accuracy.
What did you think of today's newsletter?Your feedback helps us create the best science snags possible. |
Curated by Haresh Suppiah