Increase in the effectiveness of technical displacement  in tennis players through specific coordination exercises Aumento de la eficacia de la técnica de desplazamientos en jugadores de tenis a través de ejercicios específicos de coordinación
	Departamento de Ciencias Humanas y Sociales de la Universidad de las Fuerzas Armadas ESPE. (Ecuador)	Ph.D. Santiago Calero Morales sscalero@espe.edu.ec Dr. Enrique Chávez Cevallos mechavez1@espe.edu.ec Bach. Esteban Casares Benítez fonn40@hotmail.com
	Abstract           This research aims to implement a set of specific coordination exercises to increase the effectiveness of technical movements in tennis players of the Tennis Association of Pichincha, Ecuador. Eight players from 15 to 18 years old are undergone to a study, observationally assessing 7 parameters (Split Step, Side Scrolling, Diagonal Scrolling, Forward Movement, Backward Movement, recovery of the Initial Position and their effectiveness) before and after the proposal are implemented. For the evaluation of the parameters, there were selected 7 specialists with a high level of reliability in observational records. The study demonstrates the existence of improvements in the management process of sports training to increase the effectiveness in the technical movements depending on the coordination of the sample under study, since the evidence of Wilcoxon signed-rank test determined a significant difference in effectiveness between the pre-test and post-test, techniques for Forehand Hit (Right: 0.028 and 0.031 respectively) and Hit backhand (Hitting Backhand: 0.028 and 0.31 respectively).           Keywords: Tennis. Mobility. Coordination. Effectiveness. Forehand hit. Backhand hit.   Resumen           La investigación tiene como objetivo implementar un conjunto de ejercicios de coordinación específicos para aumentar la eficacia de los movimientos técnicos en los jugadores de tenis de la Asociación de Tenis de Pichincha, Ecuador. Ocho jugadores de 15 a 18 años fueron sometidos a un estudio en el que se evaluó mediante la observación siete parámetros (Paso Split, Desplazamiento horizontal, Desplazamiento Diagonal, el movimiento hacia adelante, hacia atrás, la recuperación de la posición inicial y la eficacia de estos) antes y después de implementada la propuesta. Para la evaluación de los parámetros fueron seleccionados siete especialistas con un alto nivel de fiabilidad en los registros de observación. El estudio demuestra la mejora de la gestión del proceso de entrenamiento deportivo para aumentar la eficiencia en los movimientos técnicos, en función de la coordinación de la muestra estudiada, ya que la prueba con rangos de signos de Wilcoxon determina una diferencia significativa en la eficacia entre el pre-test y el post-test, en las técnicas del golpe de derecha (derecha: 0,028 y 0,031, respectivamente) y revés (golpe de revés: 0,028 y 0,31, respectivamente).           Palabras clave: Tenis. Movilidad. Coordinación. Eficacia. Golpe directo. Golpe de revés.   Reception: 03/29/2016 - Acceptance: 10/07/2016   1st Review: 06/22/2016 - 2nd Review: 06/07/2016
	EFDeportes.com, Revista Digital. Buenos Aires - Año 21 - Nº 218 - Julio de 2016. http://www.efdeportes.com/

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Introduction

    The process of directing the sport training of the tennis player include multiple factors (Ortiz, 2004; Vila, 2006; Hurtado, 2011; Reilly; Hughes & Lees, 2013; Coutinho, 2014-2015) which are decisive to reach a high performance. These factors take part of the process since the initial training of players at early ages until the multilateral development through which they pass during their active life.

    The coordination of the tennis player is highly important during the training (Grosser & Schonborn, 2002; Bourqouin, 2003; Weineck, 2005; Knudson, 2006; Ivancevic et al, 2010); for that reason several exercises are designed for the preparation of the tennis player according to previously stated goals, as it is set in Freo (1998).

    In scientific literature stand out papers related to the significance of the coordination capacity during the process of learning the tennis player’s skills (Meierhofer, 1989; Torres and Carrasco, 1998; Zetou, Vernadakis, Tsetseli, Kampas & Michalopoulou, 2012), since this ability, according to the aforementioned authors, is one of the most important aspects of the specific sport training, taking into account that the coordination skills are the most significant elements in order to identify if a program improves the teaching-learning process of tennis. Other papers tackle some tests to evaluate skills related to the serve (Mantis, Zachopoulou & Mavridis, 1998), which include mobility and coordination, while Abernethy (1988) studies the effects of age and the experiences in the development of perception skills in racket sports; based on this paper, Fatouros, Aggelousis, Gourgoulis & Taxildaris (2003) valuate the effect of age and gender in the coordination abilities during childhood. The above is a deduction that the work of the coordination ability is vital to systematically increase the sport performance of the tennis player since the early ages until the utmost performance.

    The estimation of the effectiveness in sports is vital to establish indicators that evaluate the sport performance, and for that several statistic formulas are applied. Some of them can be checked at FIVB (2003), Iriarte, (2004), Campo (2008), Calero (2009-2010), Menayo (2010), Baiget, Iglesias, Vallejo & Rodríguez (2011) & Losada, Casa & Árda (2015), among others.

    In addition, there are scales established to quantitatively and qualitatively determine the performance according to the function-objective to be determined (Solanellas, 1999; Lacambra, Gimeno & Colas, 2012; Calero, Suárez & Fernández, 2012a,b; Flores, Calero, Arancibia & García, 2014a,b), a useful aspect to compare and indicate performance levels.

    Specifically, there are several studies that apply hitting performance tests (Vergauwen et al., 1998; Vergauwen et al., 2004; Moya et al., 2010), for that reason this might be a good method to establish indicators that demonstrate the improvement or not of a determined process.

    On the other hand, the definition of displacement tackled in this paper is closely related to the concept of sport technique, which is considered, from the biomechanical point of view, as a feature of the sport disciplines which are highly standardized in practical terms through a rational and ideal technical model, and more in those that are not directly opposed to the rival (Nitsch, Neumaier, Marées & Mester, 2002; Izquierdo, 2008; McGarry, O'Donoghue & Sampaio, 2013; León, Calero & Chávez, 2014), but apart from being based on the laws of classic Physics, are related to the theory and methodology of the sport training through the definition of execution parameters and performance standards, which allow an immovable link between technique and tactic, hence the tennis player’s displacement (opposition sport) is inextricably linked to the technical movement and its relation with the tactic (Izquierdo, 2008).

    Because of that, the results of both components of the training will determine the existence or not of an appropriate final performance, especially in sports of cooperation-opposition (Calero, 2009), which will not only depend on that link, but on the relation and strengthening of other sport abilities (Martin, 2011; McGarry, O'Donoghue & Sampaio, 2013; Calero y González, 2015).

    As it is stated by Vasconcelos (2000), an athlete with a deficient technique will see their load ability limited as long as the fatigue of the coordinative deficiency is quite precocious. In a way or another, the physical skills of an athlete are interrelated and all of them, ones more than others have a general influence in the efficient performance of the athlete, which is expressed through the sport output. The increase of the mobility in the tennis player is vital to reach high performances, for that reason it is our strategic goal to increase the displacement levels of the player of the Tennis Association of Pichincha through the design of special coordination exercises.

Material and methods

    Eight athletes between 15 and 18 years old will be studied. They are part of the Tennis Association of Pichincha, Republic of Ecuador. There is also a selection of 7 specialists in statistics applied to tennis to quantitatively and qualitatively evaluate several observational indicators related to coordination (Split Step, Side Scrolling, Diagonal Scrolling, Forward Movement, Backward Movement, Recovery of the Initial Position and Effectiveness). These specialists have been undergone to a reliability qualitative test, using the modified Anguera (1987) method. Each scorer-evaluator will record the data in groups of 5 per parameter in the corresponding order, evaluating the amount of actions and classifying them into “Acceptable” and “Unacceptable”, during the game (three sets).

    It is used Microsoft Excel 2013 to tabulate the data and determine basic statistics, mainly descriptive; on the other hand it will be used the SPSS v21 to determine the Wilcoxon signed-ranks test, under a signification level of 0,05.

    The exercises designed to increase the mobility based on the coordination were applied during six months, and they are described as follows.

Table 1. Exercise 1

Table 2. Exercise 2

Table 3. Exercise 3

Table 4. Exercise 4

    As part of the design was included other plyometric means to specifically work the Power based on Coordination.

Table 5. Scales of quantitative and qualitative values for the evaluation of the results

    The previous values were created to establish evaluation indicators as those created to establish evaluable parameters that pursuit other goals but have points in common, as they were detailed by Calero, Suárez & Fernández (2012a,b) and Flores, Calero, Arancibia & García (2014a,b).

Analysis of the results and discussion

Table 6. Initial observations of the mobility of the players undergone to the study. Effectiveness by parameters.

Nº	Parameters	Right				Backhand				Total
		Acceptable	Unacceptable	Total	%	Acceptable	Unacceptable	Total	%	M
1	Split step	9	21	30	30.00	6	15	21	28.57	29.29
2	Side Scrolling	16	10	26	61.54	10	8	18	55.56	58.55
3	Diagonal Scrolling	12	7	19	63.16	14	6	20	70.00	66.58
4	Forward Movement	5	6	11	45.45	5	6	11	45.45	45.45
5	Backward Movement	16	9	25	64.00	17	6	23	73.91	68.96
6	Initial Position recovery	20	18	38	52.63	16	7	23	69.57	61.10
Total Effectiveness percent					52.80%				57.18%	54.59%
Evaluation					R				R	R

    The Effectiveness is processed through the calculation between the acceptable and the total (Example: Split step = 9/30 = 30.00%). This statistic formula is usually used in tennis as in other sports such as volleyball; as it was demonstrated in FIVB (2003), Iriarte (2004), Campo (2008), Calero (2009-2010), Menayo (2010), Baiget, Iglesias, Vallejo & Rodríguez (2011) and Losada, Casa & Ardá (2015), previously mentioned.

    The aforementioned delimits a level of effectiveness of 30.00% in the Split step; an effectiveness of 61.54% in the side scrolling; an effectiveness of 63.16% in the diagonal scrolling; and effectiveness of 45.45 in the Forward Movement; an effectiveness of Backward Movement of 64.00% and an effectiveness in the Initial Position Recovery of 52.63%. The Total Effectiveness in the Forehand Hit was determined at 52.80 %.

    On the other hand, the effectiveness study in the indicators for the movement technique of Backhand Hit determined an effectiveness of 28.57% for the split step; of 55.56% for the side scrolling; 70.00 % of diagonal scrolling; 45.45% for the Backwards scrolling of 73.91% and for the Initial Position Recovery of 69.57%. While the total effectiveness percentage is of 54.59%, higher than the total effectiveness of the technique with the Forehand Hit (52.80%).

    Based on Table 5 (Scale of values), the percentage of the total effectiveness reached by the players undergone to the study in the initial phase of the investigation determined an Average (R) qualitative indicator for the Backhand Hit technique (57.18%) as for the Forehand Hit technique, since the effectiveness data are in the range 50-65.4%.

    After determining the percents of effectiveness of the observational indicators previously described, it was applied the strategy with the new coordination exercises in order to evaluate the existence or not of improvements in the direction process of the sport training of the tennis player studied.

Table 7. Final observations of the mobility in the players undergone to study after the application 

of the proposal of coordination exercises for a six-month period. Effectiveness by parameters

Nº	Parameters	Forehand				Backhand				Total
		acceptable	unacceptable	Total	%	acceptable	unacceptable	Total	%	M
1	Split step	15	14	29	51.72	11	9	20	55.00	53.36
2	Side Scrolling	20	11	31	64.52	16	7	23	69.57	67.04
3	Diagonal Scrolling	15	5	20	75.00	13	4	17	76.47	75.74
4	Forward Movement	9	4	13	69.23	10	4	14	71.43	70.33
5	Backward Movement	17	6	23	73.91	18	4	22	81.82	77.87
6	Initial Position recovery	21	9	30	70.00	17	6	23	73.91	71.96
Total Effectiveness percent					67.40				71.37	69.38
Evaluation					B				B	B

    As it has been stated (by applying the proposal for a six-month training period), the results reached are described in Table 7, where the effectiveness reached in the Split Step indicator or parameter for the Forehand Hit technique was of 51.72 %, the Side Scrolling effectiveness of 64.52%, Diagonal Scrolling of 75.00%, Forward Scrolling 69.23%, the Backwards Scrolling of 73.91% and the Initial Recovery Position 70.00% of effectiveness. The Right Hit technique had a total effectiveness of 67.40% obtaining a qualitative evaluation according to the scale of values of Table 5 (Rank: 65.5 -75.4 %) of Good (B).

    On the other hand, the data obtained in the Backhand Hit technique obtained the following results of the effectiveness reached in Split Step parameter of 55.00 %, the effectiveness of the Side Scrolling of 69.57%, the Diagonal Scrolling 76.47%, the Forward Scrolling of 70.30%, the Backward Scrolling of 81.82% and the Initial Position Recovery of 73.91%. The Backhand technique obtained a total effectiveness percentage of 71.37%, obtaining a qualitative evaluation according to the scale of values of Table 5 (Rank: 65.5 -75.4 %) Good (B).

    Both the data obtained in table 6 and 7 showed that the Backhand Hit technique, has presented a higher sport performance in terms of coordination than the Forehand Hit technique.

Table 8. Comparison of the Forehand Hit technique effectiveness before

and after the application of the proposal. Wilcoxon signed-ranks test

    The Wilcoxon signed-ranks test determined the existence of significant differences by comparing the effectiveness before and after the application of the proposal (0.028) under a signification level of 0.05. The Ranks established six positive values, showing an improvement in all the parameters evaluated after the implementation of the coordination exercises. The Wilcoxon test and its frequencies strengthened the previous statements, since the value of the bilateral signification was lower than the signification level expected (0.031).

Table 9. Comparison of the effectiveness in the Backhand Hit technique before

and after the application of the proposal. The Wilcoxon signed-ranks test

    As in the Forehand Hit technique, the Backhand Hit technique determine an improvement in the six parameters (Positive Ranks) after applying the proposal of coordination exercises for a six-month period. The asymptotic significations was established in the Wilcoxon signed-ranks test in 0.028, lower than the signification level expected (0.05), for which significant positive differences are established for the postest, leading to an improvement of the sport performance in terms of coordination according to the results measured by the observers in competitions where the players of the study participated. On the other hand, the previous statements were reinforces by applying the Wilcoxon signed-ranks test, since both the Frequencies (Positive Differences: 6) and the signification level (0.031) determined the positive values expected after the implementation of the proposal designed.

    For that reason, we agree with authors Meierhofer (1989), Torres & Carrasco (1998) and Zetou, Vernadakis, Tsetseli, Kampas & Michalopoulou (2012) that the coordination capacity and its relation with the mobility is of great importance in the learning of the tennis player skills and their sport performance. For which the training of the athlete depends on the training level of the coordination capacities (Grosser & Schonborn, 2002; Bourqouin, 2003; Weineck, 2005; Knudson, 2006; Ivancevic et al, 2010).

Table 10. Level of reliability reached by the specialists

    Table 10 specific, based on the comparisons of the six specialist in relation with the expert specialist, an index of the measures of the central trend higher than 95 percent, (Arithmetic Mean: 96.88, Median: 98.44), inferring the existence of high reliability, with a margin of error of less than 5 percent.

Conclusions

    The design and implementation of the specific coordination exercises has significantly contributed to increase the performance of the the forehand and backhand hitting techniques, as demonstrated by the Wilcoxon signed-ranks test before and after applying the proposal. Therefore, the effectiveness increases in the mobility or displacement of the tennis player based on coordination.

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