(33) PEAK MATCH RUNNING DEMANDS IN COLLEGIATE WOMEN’S SOCCER ATHLETES

Contemporary athlete monitoring practices utilize Global Positioning Systems (GPS) to determine training and competition profiles. The determination of peak match running demands, distances covered in varying time durations, is commonly examined to plan training drills, match simulations, and conditioning drills. To date, these peak match running demands have not been determined in collegiate female soccer athletes.

Purpose: The purpose was to quantify the peak match running demands for varying time durations in collegiate women’s soccer matches and to compare these demands between positional groups.

Methods: Twenty collegiate women’s soccer athletes (forwards=4, midfielders=9, defense=7) participated in this study. GPS (Polar Team Pro, Polar Electro, Bethpage, NY) data were collected across an entire competitive season of 17 soccer matches. Data were only included in athletes who played for >10 minutes in a match. Individual GPS files were analyzed to determine total distance covered over rolling durations lasting 30s, 1 minute, 2 minutes, 3 minutes, and 5 minutes. The maximum relative speed (m·min^-1) value for each time duration was determined as peak match running demand. A two-way repeated measures ANOVA was completed with Bonferroni corrections for pairwise comparisons between positional groups and time durations (α=0.05).

Results: There was no significant position by time duration interaction (p=0.713) and no significant differences between positional groups (p=0.663). The average peak match running demands durations lasting 30s (216±17 m·min^-1), 1 minute (173±11 m·min^-1), 2 minutes (146±9 m·min^-1), 3 minutes (134±8 m·min^-1), and 5 minutes (123±7 m·min^-1) significantly decreased as time duration increased (p< 0.001).

Conclusions: Peak running demands during collegiate women’s soccer matches do not differ between the major playing positions. As can be expected, relative speed will decrease when examined across longer durations of a match. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS: An understanding of the peak match demands in collegiate women’s soccer will allow practitioners to develop appropriate training and conditioning drills to prepare athletes for the demands of competition. While the physical capabilities of the athletes and tactical approaches to matches need to be considered, these results would suggest that practitioners do not need to alter these drills based on the position of the soccer athletes. Future research should examine the peak match intensities of other related external load metrics so that practitioners may collectively apply these data to develop specific training and conditioning drills for athletes.

Acknowledgements: None