Soccer Headgear
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The head of a youth soccer league wants your opinion about soccer head gear. A small, but vocal, group of parents want all children to wear head gear during the season. This would be very expensive and the chairman wants to know if it is worth the investment. He asks you to assess a team during two games, one with headgear on and one with them off. You are able to rent pressure strips for the team to wear around their heads. You are also able to rent a catapult system to monitor the athletes’ velocities during the contest. Ironically (or maybe because it is exam) every athlete gets a head contact in each game. The force of impact and the athletes’ velocity at the time were all recorded.
For reference what the head gear looks like:https://www.sportsunlimitedinc.com/gamebreaker-multi-sport-soft-shell-protective-headgear.html?Color=Royal&Size=XS&utm_source=adwords&utm_medium=pla&country=US&CID=PPC&gclid=Cj0KCQiAmKiQBhClARIsAKtSj-lgPljTEm69fR88WwH6PFYcxGY_cByt3ELO7X-VhnwJjMgBDxBa0YQaAhdsEALw_wcB
For reference of what the pressure strips would do:
https://www.tekscan.com/
Project:
A. Demonstration of background knowledge
1. What are problems with movement analysis that the coach needs to be aware of and will have to account for when doing this assessment? Is the 100hz (pressure sensor) and 25 hz (catapult system)data collection rate appropriate for this analysis? Why or why not. Explain why synchronization would be important between the two systems? Suggest how you could synchronize the two systems. What would be the pros, cons of these types of movement analysis.
2. Also provide summaries of other research that has looked into this issue:
3. Use appropriate statistics to provide an answer to the question of “Is it worth getting head gear for all soccer teams.”
4. Do the results surprise you or are they what was expected. Why or why not? What is your hypothesis of why the results are the way they are?
5. Could you have collectedother data to appropriately answer the question or would was this the best data to collect?
Sample Solution
When assessing the effectiveness of soccer headgear, there are several movement analysis problems that the coach needs to be aware of in order to accurately monitor and measure data. The first is the accuracy of the data being collected. The 100hz pressure sensor and 25hz catapult system used for this assessment both have their respective limitations due to relatively low sampling rates which could lead to discrepancies between actual force impacts and those recorded (Elliott et al., 2020). This means that while they may be able provide general insight into how headgear affects player performance it would not be sufficient for a full evaluation since some impacts may not register or show up as weaker than they actually were when looking at the data later on. Additionally, athletes can vary greatly in terms of size, strength and agility meaning what works well for one person might not work as well for someone else so individual assessments should also done if possible (Lynch et al., 2016). Lastly, depending on the type of field surface being used different material such as rubber or artificial turf will affect how players move differently; this is important because if certain surfaces aren’t taken into account then certain movements won’t translate over properly leading to skewed results (Lalor & Walsh , 2009). Based on these considerations it seems like a higher sampling rate would need to be employed in order get more accurate readings when considering larger forces along with ensuring that all potential variables are accounted for during assessments such as surface types, individual differences etc.
