Nerds Only - Unlocking Peak Performance: Analyzing High School Football Through GPS Metrics

00:00 Introduction
01:47 Speed Analysis
03:23 Dynamic Stress Load

GPS Data Analysis for Football Athlete

Overview

• Analyzed GPS data of a football athlete who plays offense and defense.
• Covered a total distance of 3.61 miles during the game.
• High speed running: 334 yards at over 15.6 miles per hour.
• High intensity distance: 858 yards including sprints, accelerations, and decelerations.
• Sprint distance: Focused on distances covered at higher speeds.
• Max speed in full pads: 19.65 mph.
• Notable number of sprints, accelerations, and decelerations.
• Balanced step distribution indicates limb health.
• Dynamic stress load is relatively high, suggesting recovery considerations.
• 79 impacts during the game.

Assumptions

• Conditioning and practice may need adjustments based on game demands.
• Higher stress load due to muscular development may require tailored recovery.
• Second half showed increased sprint distances and top speeds.

Testing Strategy

• Compare first and second half data for insights into performance changes.
• Consider training strategies focusing on sprint-based activities.
• Evaluate impact of game demands on athlete's physical readiness.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:27

All right, welcome. So this is for my nerdy, my nerdy audience, those that are into the data. We're going to be breaking down some GPS information on. A football athlete Plays both ways, offense and defense. He's here at a local high school. They just play a game on Friday and we're able to gather all that information. He on defense is a linebacker and moves around on offense.

Speaker 1: 0:51

So, first and foremost, you'll see right here we've got total distance. So the athlete covered 3.61 miles throughout the entire game. High speed running 334 yards. This is over, I believe, 15.6 miles per hour. So there's a precursor. That happens and when the unit's moving that fast it starts to track the yards. So anything underneath that's not going to get tracked. Under the high speed running you have the high intensity distance 858. Now this includes high speed running as well as total sprint distance and acceleration and deceleration. So how many yards were covered?

Speaker 1: 1:29

While there was a quick decel or a quick excel, we got sprint distance going to be again over a higher metric of speed. How many yards were covered? Go in and look exactly at what it's set at, but I believe it's like 17 miles an hour. So, as you can see, here you can really break this down. Number one is I think oftentimes conditioning and practice doesn't match the needs of sport. Now you'll see throughout a full game covered 3.61 miles over that, two hours, and you can see a lot of it is sprint based for sure when it comes to football.

Speaker 1: 2:04

Now let's look at the speed. We've got his max speed in full pads in 19.65. That's pretty fast actually. That's a really good number again for a football player in full pads in 19.65, that's pretty fast actually. That's a really good number again for a football player in full pads. During the game he had seven total sprints that were over that prerequisite speed of 17 point something mile per hour. He had 54 accelerations and 41 decels. So emphasizes things. Number one ability to excel and decel or change direction. That is imperative for game speed for athletes, right, and be able to. You want them to be able to display their speed on the field. They need to be very good accelerating, decelerating, which is some of the stuff we work on. Facility. And number two game speed. Right, so you hit 1965, that's not his fastest run ever, but being able to reach those speeds and then be able to accelerate and decelerate efficiently is what's going to make you look fast on the field Intensity, so distance per minute covered six yards total through each minute.

Speaker 1: 3:09

And then high speed running per minute, 12 yards. High intensity distance, so acceleration, deceleration, 6.62 yards and then the total sprint distance per minute is 12 yards as well. So, as you can see, per minute demands again very short accelerations and sprints and then on the stress side, balance 50-50. That's great, we want to look for that. He's probably pretty healthy on both limbs, doesn't have any indicators of a future injury. Based on that dynamic stress load 424. That's actually fairly high from what I've seen with my athletes. He's a little bit heavier athlete in terms of well-developed muscular. Higher costs for those acceleration, deceleration and sprints for those athletes, my lighter athletes way down in the 200s. So that would mean this athlete. If you were looking at this data for each athlete, this athlete might need a little bit easier.

Speaker 1: 4:06

Monday, recovery day. Monday, tuesday, making sure the athlete's ready to go, and then 79 impacts. So how many times he made contact on the field? 79 times. So if we want to get a little bit deeper into this, we can actually look at first and second half comparisons. You'll see the volume is very similar. The high speed running was packed into that second half. Comparisons you'll see the volume is very similar. The high speed running was so packed into that second half. City distance was again very similar. Distance was much higher in the second half for him. So he's hitting higher top speeds in the second half and then we'll go over to speed. Uh.

Speaker 1: 4:40

First half, you know, if you're at the game you can maybe have some insight into why he wasn't able to open it up as much. But in the second half he hit that 19.65. The majority of his sprints were there as well, as his acceleration and deceleration were actually more in the first half, which again gets the brain turning. You know those lower speeds I think this is what football is typically played at more so it's at 16 miles per hour. He's having more accelerations and decelerations. That's more where you can control your speed, potentially running longer routes. Here breakaway plays, accelerate and decelerate as aggressively for it to count and he hit higher top speeds. So having both capacities will show in different phases of the game. So for him it's important that he's good in both activities, when it comes to changing directions as well as running fast.

Speaker 1: 5:30

Intensity similar between first and second half. You'll see here pretty balanced. And then the stress, extreme load and impacts again pretty even towards this. So interesting data. Again, there's a lot of universities, high schools that break this down for every athlete, every game and potentially every practice. This allows us to get a little bit better insight into the demands of the athlete and what is actually needed in their training, as well as, if a sport coach was to dive into this, how to replicate some of this in sport or in their practices. And again, I think that's going to be more sprint based training versus a cardio or conditioning or jogging. So any questions, let me know. I appreciate you guys. Again, nerdy episode for the ones that are into this and uh and for some more down the road.