BIO-BANDING from concept to practice in sports

Abstract

Introduction: The bio-banding (BB) concept refers to the practice of grouping athletes based on attributes associated with growth and maturation instead of chronological age. Lately, the advantages and disadvantages of bio-banding are widely debated in the world of sports. Supporters of this method consider that this is a more correct way of grouping athletes giving greater equality in selection, training, and competition and so, decreasing the risk of injury. This paperaims to increase awareness and interest in bio-banding and for this reason, we analyzed the existent evidence on this topic to highlight the benefits, implications, limitations, importance, and impediments when it comes to applying it in the sports field.Methods: For the literature review, we used Google Academic as a search engine and bio-banding as the main keyword. We chose to document this concept only regarding boys because approaching both genders is much more complex if we take into account the differences in terms of growth and maturation. To have a clear line of research, we chose to study this concept in terms of applicability in football, being a sport that is highly popular in our country.Results: After the primary analysis we selected a total of 20 relevant studies that were analyzed and discussed to establish and highlight the advantages and disadvantages of this method of selection and grouping in sports.Conclusion: Bio-banding can be a missing jigsaw of the training for youth athletes but further longitudinal studies are needed in order to clarify the advantages of bio-banding use.