Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Researcher giving Diamonds an edge - ABC Online


While outdoor sports use GPS tracking technology to measure player distance and speed, researchers have found it hard to bring the technology inside - until now.


The AIS and Netball Australia have just recruited Victoria University PhD student Alice Sweeting who is using radio frequency tracking equipment to provide coaches with real-time data on players' workloads.


"We have little devices placed around the courts in specific locations that act as our satellites," Alice told 666 ABC Canberra.


AIS scholarship netballer and under-21 player Jo Weston was surprised to learn she ran almost five kilometres in one of the recorded games.


"I did not know how much distance we travelled in a game. I thought it might be two or three kilometres but I think last time I played a full game and it ended up being 4.7 kilometres," she said.


"It definitely makes me feel a bit better about being puffed at the end of each quarter."


Australia's test team, the Diamonds, will begin using the technology during a training camp in July, but coach Lisa Alexander was already intrigued by results in junior players.


"Certainly from our point of view it's going to really revolutionise our coaching programs," she said.


"We'll certainly look at our strength and conditioning programs... that can be much more scientific instead of us relying on fairly old research.


"This is going to be current, cutting edge research and our strength and conditioning coaches will take that information and start to put that into the types of training that is done in preparations for netball."



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