Indicators to evaluate the exercise load in basketball

Abstract

One of the most interesting works for sport scientists is to analyze workloads during training or competition in athletes. However, this also generated great scientific controversies because of the difficult to interpret physiological responses of the parameters analyzed and to draw conclusions in order to improve the training systems. In team sports, particularly in basketball, this evaluation has even more difficulties. This is mainly because basketball is a sport that is not well known physiologically. Final performance depends directly on many different variables with different orientation. There are a series of priority aspects in the resolution of the competition that have a technical and tactical character. The training systems are very flexible due to injuries, travels, competition results. Real time during the development of the contents is lacking and finally there are significant differences between player positions on the court. Thus, we can conclude that the control of training load in basketball needs more scientific evidence to establish the protocols for analytic evaluation. The purpose of this brief review is to organize the knowledge on basketball based on scientific works that describes the analytical parameters to control the training and competition load.