Classifying Skills, Coaching & Practice/Feedback
What are the two classifications of skills based on whether the environment remains stable or changes during performance?
Closed and open skills
What Newton's law states that every action has an equal and opposite reaction?
Newton's Third Law of Motion.
What happens to heart rate during exercise as exercise intensity increases? Why?
Heart rate increases to increase cardiac output and deliver more oxygen and nutrients to working muscles.
What fitness component is the ability of a muscle or muscle group to exert maximal force?
Muscular strength.
What training principle states that training must place a greater-than-normal stress on the body to produce adaptation?
Progressive overload
A basketball player repeatedly practices free throws without defenders, distractions or changing conditions. What type of practice is this, and why?
Fixed practice, because the skill is performed repeatedly in the same conditions.
A tennis player increases the length of their racket swing to generate greater force when hitting the ball. Which biomechanical principle are they applying?
Range of motion (ROM) — increasing the distance over which force is applied can increase the velocity of the racket head and therefore the speed of the ball.
Which energy system is predominantly responsible for providing energy during a very short, maximal effort such as a 5-second maximal sprint?
The ATP-PC system.
A 1500 m runner needs to sustain a relatively high intensity for several minutes. Which fitness component is most important overall?
Aerobic power
Which training method involves repeated periods of work followed by periods of recovery?
Interval training.
A coach allows a beginner to practise a tennis serve by breaking the movement into the ball toss, backswing, contact and follow-through before putting the components together. What practice method is being used?
Part practice.
A basketball player wants to increase the stability of their defensive stance. Identify two biomechanical changes they could make.
They could lower their centre of gravity and increase their base of support.
During a prolonged run, an athlete begins to experience fatigue as muscle glycogen stores become depleted. Explain why glycogen depletion can contribute to fatigue.
Glycogen provides glucose for ATP production, particularly through glycolysis and aerobic metabolism. As glycogen stores decrease, the athlete's ability to maintain a high rate of ATP resynthesis is reduced, contributing to fatigue and decreased exercise intensity.
A netball player repeatedly sprints, changes direction, jumps and then recovers before repeating the sequence. Identify three fitness components that are important for this activity.
Possible answers include speed, agility, muscular power, anaerobic capacity, aerobic capacity, muscular endurance and coordination.
A cyclist increases their weekly training distance from 100 km to 150 km in one week. Which training principle are they applying, and what potential problem could occur if the increase is too large?
They are applying progressive overload. If the increase is excessive, they may experience overtraining, excessive fatigue or injury.
A coach tells a gymnast, "Your landing was unstable because your knees were too straight. Bend your knees more when absorbing the force." Identify the type of feedback and explain why it is useful.
Augmented feedback, specifically knowledge of performance (KP). It provides information about how the movement was performed, allowing the athlete to make a technical correction.
A figure skater pulls their arms close to their body while spinning and subsequently rotates faster. Explain this using the principle of conservation of angular momentum.
When the skater brings their arms closer to their axis of rotation, their moment of inertia decreases. Because angular momentum is conserved, their angular velocity increases, causing them to spin faster.
An athlete completes a 10-second maximal effort followed by a 60-second recovery, then repeats the effort. Explain how the contribution of the ATP-PC system changes between the first and second efforts.
The ATP-PC system is highly dominant during both maximal efforts, but after the first effort, phosphocreatine (PC) stores are partially depleted. During the recovery period, PC is resynthesised using energy from the aerobic system. If recovery is incomplete, less PC is available for the second effort, potentially reducing the athlete's ability to produce maximal power.
An athlete's activity analysis shows that their sport consists primarily of short, explosive efforts separated by periods of lower-intensity movement. Which energy system and fitness components should be prioritised in their training? Justify your answer.
Training should emphasise the ATP-PC and anaerobic glycolytic systems, because the athlete repeatedly performs high-intensity efforts. Important fitness components would include speed, muscular power, anaerobic capacity and agility, with aerobic capacity also important for recovery between efforts.
A coach wants to improve an athlete's aerobic capacity. They prescribe 4 × 5-minute efforts at a high intensity with 2-minute recovery periods between efforts. Identify the training method and explain two physiological (chronic) adaptations that could improve aerobic performance.
This is interval training. Adaptations could include increased stroke volume, improved cardiac output, increased mitochondrial density, improved capillarisation and increased ability to utilise oxygen.
A highly skilled soccer player is preparing for a match. The coach initially uses whole practice in a realistic game environment but then introduces variable practice where the player must perform the skill under different levels of defensive pressure, angles and speeds. Explain why variable practice is particularly appropriate for this athlete.
The athlete is likely in the autonomous stage of learning, so they can handle greater complexity and external demands. Variable practice exposes them to conditions similar to those encountered during competition, improving adaptability, decision-making and transfer of learning to unpredictable situations.
A long jumper changes their take-off technique by increasing the horizontal velocity they carry into the take-off while maintaining an appropriate vertical velocity. Explain how this can influence jump distance and identify the biomechanical trade-off involved.
Greater horizontal velocity can increase the horizontal component of the jumper's velocity, contributing to greater distance. However, the athlete must also generate sufficient vertical velocity to achieve an appropriate flight trajectory. Excessive horizontal velocity without adequate vertical impulse can reduce the effectiveness of the take-off. The athlete therefore needs to optimise the balance between horizontal and vertical velocity.
An athlete performs repeated high-intensity efforts with short recovery periods. Their performance progressively declines and they experience a burning sensation in the working muscles. Analyse the likely contribution of energy system fatigue and explain how recovery could help restore performance.
Repeated high-intensity efforts place substantial demands on anaerobic glycolysis, resulting in the accumulation of metabolites associated with fatigue and a reduction in the ability to maintain force and power. The ATP-PC system also requires recovery to restore phosphocreatine stores. Adequate recovery allows phosphocreatine to be resynthesised and the body to restore physiological balance, allowing subsequent efforts to be performed at a higher intensity.
Two athletes compete in different sports. Athlete A performs one continuous 60-minute endurance event, while Athlete B performs repeated 5–10 second maximal efforts separated by recovery periods. Compare the fitness and energy-system demands of the two activities and explain why their training programs should differ.
Athlete A requires high aerobic capacity and muscular endurance, with the aerobic system providing the majority of ATP over the prolonged event. Athlete B requires high speed, muscular power and anaerobic capacity, with substantial reliance on the ATP-PC system, supplemented by anaerobic glycolysis. Therefore, Athlete A would emphasise longer-duration aerobic training, while Athlete B would require repeated high-intensity efforts with appropriate recovery.
A volleyball player has excellent aerobic fitness but struggles to repeatedly perform explosive jumps late in matches. Design a training approach to address this limitation. Your answer should identify an appropriate training method, relevant training principles and the fitness components being targeted.
A suitable approach would include resistance training and/or high-intensity interval training, with exercises such as loaded jumps, squats and repeated explosive efforts. The program should apply specificity by replicating the explosive demands of volleyball, progressive overload by gradually increasing training demands, and appropriate recovery to allow adaptation. The main fitness components targeted would be muscular power, muscular strength and anaerobic capacity.