Student Athletes' Sleep, Trimp, and Drop Jump Patterns throughout an Athletic Season

Emma Harris

eah025@bucknell.edu

Bucknell University

Student Athletes' Sleep, TRIMP, and Drop Jump Patters throughout an Athletic Season

The fitness of most Olympic and high-profile professional athletes is monitored by coaches and teams using advanced tracking technologies. However, not much research exists for this type of fitness tracking in collegiate athletes, especially in women’s collegiate field hockey. Investigating the use of fitness tracking methods like heart rate monitors, drop jump techniques and simple self-recording procedures allow athletes and coaches to predict and analyze performance patters. These performance patterns can identify athletes’ weaknesses and strengths which allow for more efficient coaching and training. A performance pattern that is often overlooked is sleep as maintaining a healthy habitual sleep cycle can affect not only actual performance and heart rate but also overall motivation, recovery and perception of effort. Looking at the relationship between an athlete’s sleep patterns and competitive performance can help coaches and athletes predict and prevent potential injuries as well as sub-par performances by individualize training methods.

The work presented here focuses on three fitness tracking metrics including reactive strength index, sleep quality, and training impact (TRIMP). The reactive strength index is recorded during a drop jump. A drop jump is when a subject steps onto a box and jumps off onto a force plate then immediately jumps upwards, without bending their knees, and then lands back on the force plate. The reactive strength index is the ratio of flight time to contact time during the jump. Sleep quality and quantity is reported using self-recording procedures where athletes report the approximate hours of sleep, number of nighttime awakenings and time to fall asleep each night. TRIMP is calculated using training duration, max heart rate and average heart rate which can be obtained from the athletes’ heart rate monitors which are worn around their torsos during training. TRIMP is used by coaches and athletes as a measurement of physical exertion. This research analyzes and compares different aspects of TRIMP, reactive strength index, and sleep patterns across a given competitive season. Further investigation into the correlation between TRIMP, reactive strength index and sleep quality is important in the understanding and prediction of physical fitness and fatigue in collegiate athletes.