DOI 10.26773/smj.

190214

ORIGINAL SCIENTIFIC PAPER

Assessment of Sport Performance: Theoretical

Aspects and Practical Indications
1
Tiziana D’Isanto , Francesca D’Elia², Gaetano Raiola² and Gaetano Altavilla³
1
MIUR Campania, Italy, ²University of Salerno, Department of Human, Philosophical and Education, Salerno, Italy, ³University of Salerno, Department
of Human, Philosophical and Education, Salerno, Italy

Abstract
Sport evaluation is a fundamental moment in the training process of every athlete, every team and is an indispens-
able support for the coach. The aims and all the aspects related to the assessment, will be taken into consideration,
together to that can have a positive effect on performance, allowing each athlete, team and coach a good workout
or match, whatever their competitive level. The approach is argumentative theoretical for the part relating at the
training theory. Firstly, summarizing and deducting the scientific idea of research and of apply it in the practices of
measurement and evaluation of the sport performance. One of the topics investigated is the relationship between
genetic factors and training factors, in determining the performance of an athlete. The athlete’s evaluation process
should be useful in setting up and controlling the training and providing information to improve sport performance.

Key words: measurement, test, evaluation, training, performance

Introduction these two processes are connected to each other (Safrit, 1990).
Sport evaluation is a fundamental moment in the training The term measure indicates the process by which a variable
process of every athlete, every team and is an indispensable is assigned to a given numeric value; therefore, measuring
support for the coach. This aspect be part of in the interest is merely quantitative, objective and reproducible. Once de-
of accademic field of the scientific activity, related to the de- tected the different variables (measured quantities), through
velopment of theories, techniques and methods for training appropriate conversion calculations, it is possible to obtain all
and for the practice of different sports and motor activities and the other quantities that are defined derived quantities (Nel-
evaluations of performances (Raiola, D’elia, & Altavilla, 2018). son, 1995). This procedure takes the name of analysis, ie mat-
Sport performance is influenced by a series of factors that are hematical operations that allow to present the data collected
variously connected to each other; these factors contribute in in different form (Winter, 1979). With the term to evaluate,
determining the performance in different ways, which can be however, we mean the procedure that allows to interpret and
distinguished in quantitative, qualitative and temporal. Sport judge the measured quantity (variable detected). Often, howe-
training is a training process that aims to achieve the highest ver, the assessment is based on subjective personal experience,
possible performance under two aspects: quantitative and qu- on specific knowledge of sports activity and can also be in-
alitative (Altavilla & Raiola, 2018). To analyze the factors that fluenced by feelings, opinions and prejudices (Lariviere, God-
determine sport performance, different approaches can be bout, & Lamontagne, 1991). The evaluation can be defined as a
used, with the aim of obtaining all that information to evalua- process applied systematically to identify the dimension of the
te one or more variables, representative of one or more aspects contribution of the various factors related to sport performan-
(qualitative and quantitative) that are, in some way, related at ce. The aim of the athlete’s assessment is to set and to control
the sport performance (Nughes, Rago, & Raiola, 2017). There the training or to provide useful information to improve sport
is a difference between measuring and evaluating even though performance. All the measurement and evaluation process

Correspondence:
G. Altavilla
University of Split, Faculty of Kinesiology, Split, Croatia
E-mail: [email protected]

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must be supported by scientific research, which aims to esta- Performance factors

blish or verify the knowledge, laws, hypotheses and theories Sport performance is the result of several factors, some of
concerning the different aspects of knowledge. Furthermore, which are closely related to the athlete, hereditary and acqu-
scientific research is characterized by rigor, advertising and ired (Figure 1); while others act in an integrated way on the
controllability and uses an experimental design, which also athlete and on the team, influencing the training and competi-
presupposes statistical analysis (Jelaska, Delas Kalinski, & Cr- tion process. One of the topics of interest in sporting activities
nijak, 2017). In this paper, the aims and all the aspects related is the relationship between genetic factors (the talent is partly
to the assessment, will be taken into consideration, together to genetically determined) and training factors, in determining
that can have a positive effect on performance, allowing each the performance of an athlete (Bouchard, Malina, & Perusse,
athlete, team and coach a good workout or match, whatever 1997). According to Sergjienko (2001), the sons of the great
their competitive level. athletes have a 50% chance of inheriting notable sportive abili-
ties. A probability that rises up to 75% in the case of children of
Methods a couple of great athletes. The genetic patrimony has a funda-
The approach is argumentative theoretical for the part rela- mental role in the performance, not only the anthropometric,
ting at the training theory. Firstly, summarizing and deducting physiological and psychological characteristics can be partly
the scientific idea of research and of apply it in the practices of inherited, but also the improvement capacity induced by trai-
measurement and evaluation of the sport performance. ning (Bouchard, 1986).

Figure 1. Factors of the sport performance

Another important factor is the ability to support high altering the performance in an illegal manner; in fact, there are
training loads, which can also be inherited; positively influen- athletes that try to improve in artificial way their performan-
cing performance, limiting the possibility of incurring injuries ces, legal or illegal, healthy or harmful to health (Mazzeo, Alta-
and overtraining syndrome. This characteristic, the positive villa, D’Elia, & Raiola, 2018). Therefore, its role in determining
reaction to training, is called trainable, and can be defined as certain performances can not be ignored or underestimated,
the ability to improve one’s motor potential in response to a especially for the impact on athletes’ health and on the edu-
series of training stimuli (Issurin & Lustig, 2005). The latter is cation of young people. Doping concerns the whole society, it
inevitably linked to the sportive technique, which can be defi- involves not only elite athletes but amateurs too, their friends
ned as the set of all those elements that allow you to adapt the and relatives (Mazzeo & Raiola, 2018).
athlete’s motor behavior to the contextual situation, between
which, also, the error correction made by the coach with verbal Results
rules (Raiola, 2013), in order to obtain the best possible perfor- The assessment of sport performance can be achieved on
mance (Lees, 2002). Today is consolidated the importance of the basis of a scale of reference values; this is done considering
physical activity to health (Altavilla, D’Elia, & Raiola, 2018a), both the type of measure (test) and the descriptive statistics
but also the state of health of the athlete is important and must applied to it; or express the data collected as a percentage of
be investigated through a dual assessment, functional and the values obtained from the reference values. The initial as-
sportive fitness; while the functional one may depend on the sessment serves to identify the characteristics of an athlete or
performance, the sportive fitness has the preventive purpose of group of athletes, or to define or complete the anthropometric
excluding contraindications to competitive sportive practice, and physical-motor profile of each of them. In this case the
or to establish in the sedentary subjects the exercises devoid of tests are used to perform a sort of photograph of the athlete’s
risks (King & Senn, 1996). Related to the state of health there status and will then help to define the objectives necessary to
is certainly also nutrition, which must provide, first of all, the set up the training program (entry test).
energy substances necessary to support the training and the The assessment procedures can be proposed several times
increased food needs of the athlete. Physicality and well-being, during a sportive season, in order to evaluate the effects of tra-
contributing to the psychic development (Valentini, Bernar- ining and therefore the achievement of the planned objectives
dini, Beretta, & Raiola, 2018). Psychological factors are often in the short, medium and long term (control and outgoing te-
essential for sportive results (Raglin, 2001). Victory and defeat sts). A further opportunity to evaluate the effects of training
often depend on the athlete’s personality and in some ways on is the search of relationships with the performance (Figure
the difficult balance of emotions caused by the psychologi- 2). It is not correct to think that the performance can only be
cal relationships established between athletes (own team and investigated through one or more tests; in fact, we must not
opponents), with coaches, referees, managers, journalists, pu- forget that the best test is the match. Sometimes the tests are
blic, family and friends. Finally, even doping can contribute to administered with the purpose of motivating an athlete and in

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 ASSESSMENT OF SPORT PERFORMANCE | T. D'ISANTO ET AL.

particular cases, also to satisfy a specific desire of the athlete, made during the match, in this case the coach collects empi-
whose psychological meaning must be understood and whose rical data visually and then analyzes them only on basis of his
importance must never be underestimated. Among the diffe- experience, to quickly provide feedback to the athletes who
rent procedures that can be used there is also the assessment will use them in the same match.

Figure 2. Analysis, measurement and evaluation process

Discussion factors of the sport performance, of the operational tools and
In the last years there has been a massive entrance of per- the procedures of detection and evaluation, in order to be able
vasive computing among sport-related technologies (D’Isanto, to direct all the physical and technical programming, the met-
Altavilla, & Raiola, 2017); the use of these modern technolo- hodological choices and procedural attentions, while respe-
gies (Gps, slow motion, tracker, accelerometers, bio-sensors) cting the characteristics of the athletes and of the sport teams.
allows to provide real-time experimental data from which to The evaluation of sport performance is a fundamental moment
obtain the information useful for improving the sport per- in the training process of every athlete and every team and is
formance (Altavilla, Mazzeo, D’Elia, & Raiola, 2018b). It is an indispensable tool for every coach or sportive operator.
possible to distinguish the tests in general and specific (Dal The knowledge of the main theoretical aspects, which we have
Monte, 1983). The tests that investigate the physical qualities dealt in this study, is necessary to avoid incurring conceptual
such as strength, power, endurance, flexibility, etc., are defined errors and interpretation. It is important that every sportive
general and have the purpose of verifying the acquisition of technical includes in the training planning moments dedicated
the minimum necessary levels to proceed in training and for to the assessment, which allow him to verify the achievement
injuries prevention. When a physical quality is insufficient, the of the objectives set and also the goodness of his work.
appearance of overload or injury pathologies can be observed
Acknowledgements
and the improvement of other physical qualities or sportive There are no acknowledgements.
technique is often negatively influenced. The specific tests,
however, have a high technical value and can be studied from Conflict of Interest
time to time according to the specific needs (specific) of each The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest.
individual athlete. According to some authors (MacDougall, Received: 18 December 2018 | Accepted: 25 January 2019 | Published: 01
Wenger, & Green, 1991) this distinction concerns essentially February 2019
the place where the tests are carried out: in a laboratory, in
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