Brief Review of Methods to Quantify High-Speed Running in Rugby League: Are Current Methods Appropriate?

Abstract

High-speed running (HSR) has been documented within rugby league to differentiate playing standard and position and often precedes pivotal match events. Practitioners and researchers place importance on HSR because of its inclusion in assessing the demands of training and match play to help prescribe accurate training loads and recovery methods. HSR can be quantified in absolute terms whereby the same threshold speed is applied to all players (e.g., 5.0 m·s−1). Within rugby league, differences in tactical demand, anthropometric, and physical fitness characteristics exist between positions and players, suggesting that absolute HSR thresholds may not be appropriate because of underestimations and overestimations of HSR data. Alternatively, practitioners may individualize the threshold speed to individual players' physical qualities such as peak sprint speed, maximal aerobic speed (MAS), or the speed at which the ventilatory thresholds occur. Individualizing HSR warrants the practitioner to select a valid and practical test to quantify the HSR threshold speed. It is suggested that using peak sprint speed to quantify HSR can produce erroneous interpretation of HSR data while the practicality of specific physiological derived thresholds can be questioned. Implementing MAS to quantify HSR using a set time/distance trial may be the most appropriate approach for rugby league practitioners.

Quantifying high-speed running in rugby league: An insight into practitioner applications and perceptions

“…It is clearly highlighted that the impracticality of testing is a key barrier for rugby league practitioners, which may be a reason as to why absolute methods are applied. Rugby league squads generally exceed 30 players, so implementing an indivulaised HSR approach which requires frequent testing may prove to be problematic 1,3 . Not only would this require more staff to supervise the testing phase, but this phase could also be quite time consuming for practitioners.…”

“…High-speed running [9][10][11] , or 'high-intensity running' (HIR) 3,12,13 is an external load metric which rugby league practitioners may monitor as it often precedes pivotal match events such as try scoring 1,3 . High-speed running has been commonly used in rugby league research to quantify the time and distance above a predefined running speed when monitoring training and match-play [14][15][16][17] .…”

“…Software advancements allow practitioners to now quantify metrics such as HSR more comprehensively by allowing multiple sets of speed classification zones to be applied 11,30 . However, a standardized method to classify such zones remains absent 1 . Applying different methods to analyse HSR has previously been suggested to consider the absolute and relative demands of competition 11,30 , although practitioners may focus on one approach longitudinally 1 .…”

“…Within rugby league, teams based in both the National Rugby League (NRL) and European Super League (ESL) quantify the training loads of both training practice and match-play to analyse external load metrics they deem important. [1][2][3] External load metrics such as total distance, high-speed running (HSR) and meters per minute have all been previously reported and implemented. 4 Other external load metrics used within rugby league research include accelerations and decelerations, 5,6 repeated high-intensity efforts 7,8 and high metabolic power distance.…”

Common High-Speed Running Thresholds Likely Do Not Correspond to High-Speed Running in Field Sports

“…Furthermore, it is possible that commonly used relative thresholds are too slow to be classified as sprinting, which should be reflective of maximal or near maximal speed. This is particularly relevant given that maximum speed capabilities in match play can exceed 9 m·s −1 (4). As a result, the use of these thresholds when designing training programs and injury prevention strategies to meet the demands of competition may be compromised.…”