New Horizons in S&C: GPS Technology to Monitor Training and Game Demands
PRESENTATION SYNOPSIS
Participation in field sports such as soccer, field hockey, lacrosse and rugby continues to grow worldwide - while football remains a strong fixture within the North American sports landscape; however there is limited information available describing the physical demands experienced by athletes across all levels during matches or training sessions. This substantial knowledge gap prevents us from maximizing our ability to train, monitor and develop athletes, Collegiate strength and conditioning coaches work with players during a critical time in their athletic careers - often arriving ill prepared for the demands as incoming freshman and some leaving with potential to play at the next level. Utilization of emerging technology has become increasingly common in high performance sport around the globe in order to gain a competitive advantage. For example, new tracking devices that use Global Positioning System (GPS) technology have been developed and are now a viable option for match and training analysis in team sports. The information from GPS is invaluable for helping optimize practices, training sessions and competition preparation. More important, inclusion of GPS into the daily training environment will provide strength and conditioning coaches the unique ability to monitor training loads and help maximize the development and performance of athletes during their collegiate career. The aim of this presentation is to describe the utility of GPS technology within the team sport structure and provide an overview of some novel outcomes that have been recently obtained from a variety of sports.
BIOGRAPHY
Dr. Jason Vescovi is an exercise physiologist with a long history of working with high performance athletes in a wide variety of sports including soccer, volleyball, figure skating, lacrosse, ice hockey, field hockey, rowing, and swimming. His primary research interests have focused on issues specific to female athletes, such as ACL injury prevention and the Female Athlete Triad. He is currently leading the single largest study designed to determine the physical demands of women's soccer at all levels using GPS technology. To date the study includes players from top youth leagues, NCAA programs, Women's Professional Soccer as well as elite international athletes. His research in this area is now expanding to field hockey, lacrosse, and rugby sevens - collectively the project is called the Female Athletes in Motion (FAiM) study.
During the past decade Dr. Vescovi has consulted for several sport organizations including Women's Professional Soccer (WPS), United Soccer League (USL), US Figure Skating, Elite Clubs National League (ENCL), and Rugby Canada. He is currently a Research Associate in the School of Kinesiology and Health Science at York University, an Applied Sports Scientist at the Canadian Sport Centre Ontario and the physiologist for the Canadian Women's National Field Hockey team. He earned his doctorate from the Human Performance Laboratory at the University of Connecticut and received post-doctoral training at the University of Toronto (Women's Exercise and Bone Health Laboratory) and York University (Exercise Physiology Research Laboratory).
