Training load monitoring in team sports

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The training load monitoring plays an important role in the training process, namely controlling the stimulus imposed, the recovery process and also increasing the possibility to individualize the training. As a well-implemented practice in sports sciences departments of professional teams, training load monitoring allows us to adjust the load and identify specific oscillations that occur across the season. Despite a growing research in this topic, there are some areas uncover in the literature. Among others, there is no information about the training load process in rink oller hockey players and also there is few studies testing the impact of different type of exercises in soccer. PURPOSE: Based on that, the main purposes of this thesis is twofold: (i) describe the internal training load and well-being of professional rink hockey players during a full-season (study 1); and (ii) describe the external load of different types of exercises in professional soccer players (study 2). METHODS: Two professional teams (rink hockey and soccer) were daily monitored across the season by using perceptive internal load and well-being measures in the case of rink hockey and external load measures in the case of soccer. RESULTS: among professional rink hockey players, it was observed differences between normal and congested weeks, regarding the load imposed in training sessions. In addition, data showed significant intra week variations on the internal training load, volume and RPE, independently of the moments of competition. In the study 2 it was found that the largest load occurred in match-related exercises and also the longer periods of training were also dedicated to match-related exercises. CONCLUSIONS: The current thesis revealed that weekly periodization on rink oller hockey was generally similar to other invasion team sports better described in the literature (e.g., soccer, basketball, volleyball) using a tapering period in the day before the match. Moreover, it was also possible to identify that match-related exercises in soccer are the ones that most contribute to the overall load imposed on soccer players during the week.