To give you some background on these pathways, essentially all our complex movements are written as motor programs within the brain and stored in motor areas and supplementary motor areas in the parietal lobe of the brain. A series of motor programs can be integrated to form one motor plan. These can be influenced by ‘higher centres’ such as long-term memory and these can cause adaptation of the plans according to past experience etc. The key to the execution of these plans is the basal ganglia, which sit at the top of the spinal cord in the brain stem (and why Parkinson’s patients have such a problem with both initiating and executing movements).

All very interesting (I hope!) but how does this fit into sport? Well here’s what I know. Most of these motor programs whilst they are stored in the parietal lobe are actually executed entirely by the spinal cord and basal ganglia. This means that most movements are not consciously thought about but happen automatically. The very complex integration of muscles, joints and movements just in standing up from a chair do not generally require conscious thought – we do it without thinking at all.

So this got me thinking about complex movements in sport. Surely there must be movements made by elite players e.g. Beckham striking a free kick or Nadal hitting an early ball that cannot by their very nature be ‘thought about’. They happen immediately, reflexly and without involvement of higher centres. And there must be many more sequences of movements in all sports that happen like this. This where training comes in – if we can train drills focusing on such events, then we can write a motor plan for this eventuality. In the game setting we can execute these plans without conscious thought, instinctively, reflexly and at high speed and accuracy.

The training of drills now can have real purpose and with this understanding athletes can realise how crucial the repetitive training aspect is and how it really can give them that extra edge.

Need more convincing….take Robin Van Persie’s goal last night for Arsenal (sorry Barcelona fans). He was around three yards from the baseline, not really facing the goal and hit a tremendous strike in at the near post and into the goal. Incredibly tight angle and the commentators described how he saw the goalkeeper give him a space and he went for the shot. I beg to differ! There is no way that was a conscious decision – he instinctively hit that ball and there was only one place it was going. He has practiced it, drilled it and there’s a motor program in there for it I’m sure!

Final words on this closer to home and also to me of amazing relevance to those of us involved in grass roots sport. This automated movement is not something that is confined to elite sport – it can be taught from a very young age. The young brain is very plastic (just see how well a young brain recovers from injury / illness compared to an adult one – or take my word for it!) and its ability to learn and re-learn is incredible. So I watched my nine year old (right footed) son play for the U10 Sabres football team I coach. Last week he was through on the right with only one player to beat. He cut inside and hit the ball without changing pace immediately with his LEFT (see above) foot. Totally reflexly, no thought involved. How do I know that? Well here’s the very interesting thing…..not 5 minutes later I spoke to him about the shot at the half time talk. He totally denied hitting the ball with his left foot, that the event had even happened – he had absolutely no recollection of the shot! Why – because I am certain that that decision came totally spinally with a motor plan execution that had no higher thought involved. No decision to do it, no using past experience, no long-term memory input. The pathway had never involved his higher centres so he actually had no memory of it! Amazing!

Okay lots more to say on this topic which as I am sure you can see I am very passionate about! Just so I don’t leave you hanging here’s the other pieces of information you might want to know to finish with – in Parkinson’s the motor plans are in fact intact but the execution is at fault and alas the shot was saved and we went out of the cup

Hope that was of interest to you all – let me know your thoughts!

So in a number of sports a straight line sprint features in many assessments for talent identification, fitness and general baseline measurements. It is standard in the LTA and used in many football clubs. But here’s some conundrums for you :

1. Is it relevant to the sport / game play?

2. Does it have positive predictive value for athletic success in that sport?

3. Is there a better test that might address points 1 & 2?

Firstly we need to look at point 1. The straight line sprint is used as we have mentioned in both tennis and football in a talent identification setting. But I wonder how often in these games do athletes ever run a long distance in one go? Very seldom I would suggest. Both sports actually have much shorter sprints within the game and the movement is rarely isolated to one direction.

In terms of predicting success then clearly the test needs to replicate some kind of functional movement within the game. What straight line sprint shows is how quick an athlete is over a certain distance. No-one can dispute that and the ease and simplicity of the test. But what we are testing is acceleration but missing the very crucial element of deceleration – what use is it if in running so fast the athlete cannot then decelerate and change direction? He may be quick across the tennis baseline but if the point isn’t won on that shot then without good deceleration skills he will be hopelessly out of position for the next shot. In football that sprint back to regain position as a defender is pointless if as a result he cannot slow and change direction, the attacking forward merely has to cut inside and the defender is now beaten and too far out of position to regain the ball.

So how might we better assess movement skills that are game specific?

I decided when I started coaching my Under 10s in July 2010 I would look at 4 areas of fitness, agility and movement skills in the players and see which (if any!) could address the points above. The four tests were :

1. 80m straight line sprint

2. Illinois Agility Test

3. HotSpot 4 square agility test ©

4. Bleep test

The HotSpot 4 square agility test is a simple figure of eight with 8 changes of direction around a 2.5m square testing precision, acceleration and deceleration movement skills. The points are marked by HotSpot discs so there is drill precision and every test is identical with reliable timing by the system.

I benchmarked each player and collated the data with a view to regular interval tests to see any changes – hopefully for the better! The training sessions each week have a heavy emphasis on movement training, agility and fitness with this comprises around 50% of the time.

I have summarised the data below comparing the 80m sprint with HS 4 Square Agility Test. The athletes are scored according to their position in the group for each of the tests and the difference shown in the far column. An improvement in rank from 80m to HotSpot Agility is showed as a + with rank position change and a – for a drop in their rank :

So what does all this data mean?! Look at the end column and see the change in rank between the two tests. If we take that moving in an agile fashion and moving quickly are not only equally important but comparable then there would be very little discrepancy between the two activities ie if you were fast in a straight line then you will also be fast round an agility circuit. This would be reflected in a small change if any in the rank difference.

Well this is clearly not the case. Only 1 athlete of the top 4 in the 80m sprint is in the top 4 for the 4 square HotSpot agility test. And only 2 of the bottom 4 ranked in the sprint are in the bottom 4 in the agility test.

If as we have suggested then the ability to move with agility and to be able to change direction is actually more relevant to the sport, then this data suggests the 80m sprint test  has poor positive predictive value for the attributes necessary for the sport.

By using an automated (and affordable) system such as the HotSpot I know my times are accurate, the drills identical each time and my data is robust and is therefore useful and meaningful and can be safely interpreted.

In summary if we are designing tests then these need to be reflect the qualities we want to see in our athletes. In this experiment the HotSpot 4 square I feel proved more useful in predicting the better athlete at both extremes – quicker runners are not necessarily more agile nor are slower runners necessarily less agile.

So here’s the message – look at the attributes that you see best reflect the qualities and requirements of your sport and design a test based on that!