Suitability of soccer training drills for endurance training

摘要

Recent evidence suggests that certain soccerdrills produce exercise intensities suitable for physical conditioning.However, it remains debatable whether soccer drillscan provide a sufficiently unified exercise intensity among differentplayers and on repetition of a drill, because movementpatterns cannot be externally controlled during soccer drills.Good reliability and low variability of exercise intensity wouldenable all players to receive an appropriate training stimulus.The purpose of this study was to investigate intersubject variabilityand intrasubject reliability in exercise intensity duringsoccer drills. It was hypothesized that soccer drills that involvethe highest exercise intensities would demonstrate the lowestintersubject variability and the highest intrasubject reliability.Heart rates of 23 professional soccer players were recorded duringa range of soccer training drills. The drills consisted of 2 vs.2 to 8 vs. 8 normal scoring games and 2 further possessiongames. Heart rate responses were examined for variability, reliability,and suitability for soccer endurance training. Coeffi-cients of variation across players were less than 3% for all drills.Paired t-tests showed no significant differences in heart rate onrepetition of the drills and 95% ratio limits of agreement were1.8-3.8%. There were no significant correlations between exerciseintensity and the statistical measures of variability and reliability.Several drills produced exercise intensities suitable forsoccer endurance training with mean heart rate responses rangingfrom 87-91% HRmax. Soccer drills such as those used in thepresent study appear to be an adequate substitute for physicaltraining without the ball and thus provide simultaneous skilland fitness training. The increase in training time spent developingtechnical ability and/or a reduction in total training timerequired may be useful for soccer teams.