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The Role of Practice in Tennis Adjustments

How extra practice improves players' adaptability in tennis.

― 7 min read


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Table of Contents

Tennis is a game of quick reactions. When a player hits the ball, they have to be ready to intercept it as it comes flying toward them. This requires not just quick movement but also the ability to adjust based on different situations. Sometimes, the ball behaves unexpectedly, like speeding up or slowing down after hitting the ground. This makes it crucial for players to adapt their movements in real-time to hit the ball accurately.

Think of it like trying to catch a slippery fish with your bare hands; if it swims quicker than you expect, you need to be ready to change your move in an instant!

Motor Skills and Adjustments

In sports like tennis, players show different levels of skill when intercepting a moving target. Some players seem to have a natural talent for it, while others struggle. This difference in skill becomes especially noticeable in challenging situations, as the environment around them changes – like a windy day or a bumpy court.

Here’s the twist: Some unexpected changes can mess with a player’s plans. For instance, if a tennis ball bounces unpredictably, it can throw off the timing of the player’s hit. To tackle these surprises, players rely on two types of adjustments:

  1. Predictable Adjustments: These are based on what players already know. If they expect a change, they can plan ahead, tweaking their movements even before they start.

  2. Unpredictable Adjustments: These come into play when something unexpected happens after they’ve already started moving. In these cases, players have to switch gears quickly, making new plans on the fly.

Imagine playing a video game where the character you’re controlling suddenly speeds up. You need to react instantly, or you’ll miss the jump!

The Importance of Practice

How do players improve their ability to make these adjustments? It turns out that practice plays a huge role. When players practice beyond just their basic skills, it helps them become more adaptable in unpredictable situations. In other words, spending time honing their skills can help prepare them for anything that comes their way, even if they seem fine during practice.

It’s like going to the gym and lifting weights. If you only ever lift the same weight, you might not get stronger. But if you push yourself and try harder weights, you’ll build strength that helps you lift more in real life.

The Practice Process

When players practice to improve, they create a mental picture of how their body should move and react. This is known as an “internal representation.” Having this mental image is great for when everything goes as planned. However, if something unexpected happens, like a sudden change in the ball's speed, this mental picture may not cut it.

To deal with surprises, players need a flexible internal representation. Think of it like being ready to dance. If you know the basic steps, you can easily switch to any dance move that comes up unexpectedly, rather than just shuffling your feet awkwardly!

Research Purpose

So, what did we want to find out? We wanted to see how two different levels of practice (called stabilization and superstabilization) affect how well players can adjust to sudden changes. We used a virtual setup to test these adjustments in various scenarios.

Study Setup

In our study, we had 42 university students who had never played tennis before. We made sure they had normal vision and no issues with their arms. We used some cool tech to create a virtual interception task, where each participant had to hit a moving target on the screen.

Imagine playing a video game where you have to hit a moving object with a controller. These participants had to do just that!

The Virtual Task

Participants sat at a desk with a tablet that acted like a digital controller. Their goal was to hit a yellow square (the target) with a green rectangle (the controller) as it moved across the screen. They had to be quick about it, aiming to make contact within a specific time frame.

During practice, participants were split into two groups:

  1. Stabilization Group (SG): This group practiced until they could hit the target three times in a row.

  2. Superstabilization Group (SSG): This group needed to hit the target three times in a row six times to show they were even more consistent.

While the SG got a decent practice, the SSG went above and beyond, making their training more effective for handling surprises.

The Experiment

Once the training was complete, participants faced a new challenge where the target moved unpredictably. Sometimes it sped up, and other times it slowed down. This was designed to test their ability to adjust on the fly.

We watched closely to see how often the participants made corrections and how quickly they could adapt their movements.

Findings from the Study

Surprisingly, the SSG made more corrections and adjustments than the SG. This means that the extra practice paid off! The SSG group showed they could handle sudden changes better, improving their hit accuracy compared to the SG.

It’s like a seasoned chef who can whip up a meal without missing a beat in the kitchen, even when they have a sudden change of ingredients!

Evaluation of Performance

We measured performance in a few ways:

  1. Constant Error (CE): This looked at how far off participants were from hitting the target's center.
  2. Time to Peak Velocity (tPV%): This measured how quickly they reached the maximum speed while moving.
  3. Number of Corrections (N-cor): This counted how often they adjusted their movements.

The findings showed that the SSG group had better performance across the board. They made more corrections and were quicker to adapt, proving the effectiveness of extensive practice.

Contextual Comparisons

When we compared both groups, the SSG outperformed the SG in unpredictable settings. They had a flexible approach, allowing them to adjust their actions rapidly, much like a seasoned driver who can react to a sudden obstacle on the road.

In contrast, the SG tended to rely on what they learned during practice-so they were less adaptable. This illustrates how having a solid backup plan helps during chaotic situations.

Implications for Training

The results underscore the importance of thorough practice, especially when preparing for situations that require quick adjustments. Players who take the time to do extra practice not only become more skilled but also more adaptable when surprising challenges arise.

It’s like training for a marathon; the more distance you cover, the better you perform when faced with unexpected hills along the way!

Limitations of the Study

Of course, this study had some limitations. We looked at only two levels of unpredictability. Real-life situations often have many more layers of complexity, especially in sports where different factors come into play.

Additionally, we focused solely on adjustments after the target began moving. In real life, players have to adjust before and after the action, giving them even less time to react.

Future Directions

Future research should include various types of changes, not just speed but also direction and height. By adding more complexity, we can gain deeper insights into how players can better prepare for the unexpected.

Moreover, exploring different practice schedules could offer new ways to enhance adaptability in motor skills. This can help athletes become even better at handling surprises while ensuring they keep their cool under pressure.

Conclusion

In summary, our research emphasizes the value of more extensive practice in improving skills related to unpredictable situations. Higher levels of stability resulted in more effective adjustments and better performance.

Thinking back to our fish-catching metaphor, if you practice catching fish using various tricks, you're more likely to snag one when they start to wiggle unexpectedly. So, whether you're playing tennis or just trying to catch a fish, remember: practice makes perfect!

Now get out there, practice your swings, and keep your eyes on the ball (or fish!).

Original Source

Title: Practice beyond performance stabilization increases the use of online adjustments to unpredictable perturbations in an interceptive task

Abstract: In recent decades, research has focused on motor adjustments in interception tasks within predictable environments. However, emerging studies suggest that continued practice beyond performance stabilization enhances the ability to adapt to unpredictable events. The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of practicing until performance stabilization versus extended practice through superstabilization on the ability to adjust to unpredictable perturbations in intercepting a moving target. We hypothesized superstabilization would better facilitate motor adjustments in response to unpredictable perturbations. Forty participants engaged in an interception task until they achieved either performance stabilization or superstabilization. Subsequently, both stabilization and superstabilization groups were tested in an unpredictable environment, where, in certain trials, the targets velocity unexpectedly changed after the onset of the movement. The findings revealed that the superstabilization group made more adjustments in response to these perturbations than the stabilization group, attributed to their developed capacity to use online feedback as a control mechanism more efficiently. In contrast, the practice until performance stabilization did not foster this adaptive mechanism. These results support the notion that learning is a dynamic process that extends beyond the point of performance stabilization, emphasizing the benefits of continued practice for mastering complex motor tasks in variable contexts.

Authors: Crislaine Rangel Couto, Cláudio Manoel Ferreira Leite, Carlos Eduardo Campos, Leonardo Luiz Portes, Cíntia de Oliveira Matos, Suziane Peixoto Santos, Natália Fontes Alves Ambrósio, Hani Camille Yehia, Herbert Ugrinowitsch

Last Update: Oct 31, 2024

Language: English

Source URL: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.10.30.621165

Source PDF: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.10.30.621165.full.pdf

Licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Changes: This summary was created with assistance from AI and may have inaccuracies. For accurate information, please refer to the original source documents linked here.

Thank you to biorxiv for use of its open access interoperability.

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