Tuesday 21 st August Theory

Skill Aspects of Fitness Agility Reaction Time Balance Timing Co-ordination Movement Anticipation

Skill Aspects Agility: The ability to change direction at speed. It is the combination of speed, balance, power and coordination. Reaction time: The time taken between a stimulus (starting gun) and a response (drive out of blocks). Balance: The ability to keep our body in equilibrium when stationary or moving. Two types are –static: e.g. in gymnastics –dynamic: e.g. a surfer on a surf board

Skill Aspects Timing: The ability to perform skills at exactly the right time, with the right amount of emphasis. Co-ordination: The ability to carry out a series of movements smoothly and efficiently. It depends on our nervous and muscular systems working smoothly together. Movement anticipation: The ability to predict accurately the next set of movements that you need to make

Mental Aspects of Fitness Managing Emotions Level of Arousal Mental Rehearsal

Mental Aspects Managing Emotions: The ability to stay in control even in demanding situations. e.g.-taking a penalty, rock climbing, clash of personalities in a team. Level of Arousal-This can have a wide ranging effect on an athlete’s performance either producing very high levels of skilled performance or having disastrous effects on overall actions. There is a very difficult balance between high levels of arousal and low levels. If arousal levels are too low, performance can fail to reach high levels. On the other hand if someone is over excited, this can also have a negative effect on performance.

Mental Aspects Mental Rehearsal This can be used in a variety of different circumstances. It can be used before training, in training, prior to a competition or performance and even sometimes during a competition or performance. The athlete basically has to visualise how a skill is performed, run through the performance of a skill in their mind or develop a mental picture of a performance in their mind prior to completing the action. There are a multitude of examples of this type of fitness training: (1) Visualising the path of the ball in golf before playing the shot. (2) Thinking out how movements are to be linked together in a gymnastic sequence. (3) Any form of ‘serving’ activity in activities like tennis, badminton, table tennis, squash, volleyball, etc. (4) Complicated manoeuvres like dives or turning movements in swimming or any rotational or twisting movements used in trampolining, diving, gymnastics, etc. Note: Although this type of fitness can be used in directly competitive activities, it is more difficult to perform because you cannot predict how an opponent or opponents are going to perform.

Homework for Monday 27 th August: Select one mental aspect of physical fitness. Explain, in detail, the importance of this aspect when you are performing in Football