A Systematic Review of Team Sport Recovery Techniques
Regardless of the sport, team sports require athletes to work together and understand social cues to be successful. A good team is a group that has a clear mission and has a coach who is challenging them and looking for ways to improve.
A systematic review of recovery techniques used by team sport athletes found a variety of techniques. These included active land-based recovery, stretching and cold water immersion. In addition, pool-based recovery strategies were also found.
The majority of studies that were included quantified acceleration events using count-based metrics. In order to qualify as an acceleration event, a minimum effort duration must be sustained for a certain period of time. This is not surprising considering the practicality of count-based metrics. However, these methods do not capture athlete perceptions of the speed or intensity of the acceleration.
The second aim of the study was to examine how acceleration events were processed in team sport research. Of the studies that were included, 9% included an absolute acceleration variable. This metric allows for the calculation of acceleration load.
The majority of studies that were included did not specify the filtering settings or the minimum effort duration of the acceleration events. This could be due to differences in the tracking devices and manufacturers.
The results are limited and do not represent the whole of Australia. A future study should consider acceleration/deceleration calculations. The studies also did not report the reasons for using recovery techniques.
