A TIME-MOTION ANALYSIS OF AMATEUR RUGBY LEAGUE WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO REPEATED HIGH-INTENSITY EXERCISE

Abstract

The study aimed to investigate the physiological demands of amateur rugby league forwards and backs, through the application of time-motion analysis. Observation of ten games (n=10) was verbally coded, regarding the on-field activity of five forward (n=5) and five back positions (n=5) and upon play back was coded into a computerised system regarding the seven locomotive movement classifications. On one occasion, video recording of one position allowed a reliability assessment to be carried out. Repeated playback of playercam video footage was manually coded into a computerised match analysis system Studiocode. An intra-observer (K=0.83) and inter-observer reliability (K=0.81) study, failed to reveal any significant differences in the duration spent in each locomotive classification, reporting a very high strength of agreement. Ten players completed one 40m time-trial using electronic timing gates, in each locomotive movement to calculate velocity profiles, and estimate distances (Smartspeed Fusionsport, Australia). The mean total distance for amateur rugby players was 6540.6 ± 1003.9m, with backs (6989.4 ± 924.2m) travelling significantly greater distances than forwards (6091.7 ± 953.9m). Backs also had significantly lower work to rest ratios (1:11) than forwards (1:6), on which highlights the high-intensive intermittent nature of the game. Additionally, the repeated high-intensity exercise bouts of forwards (9.4 ± 3.8) and backs (9.6 ± 3.5) further highlights the most demanding periods of the game, changing activity on average every 5.5s. Consequently, the intermittent nature reported within the present study has an influence upon the provision of positional specific training programmes to amateur rugby league players.