Kale Hintz, Jordan Knoepfel, Patrick Wuerdman

Measurement and Evaluation of Sport

4/17/2014

1. Illinois Agility Test

2. The purpose of this test is to monitor the development of the athlete’s agility. This test is a combination of reaction time, acceleration, change of direction, and overall speed. The motor skills that were tested in this test were loco-motor skill. The specific skills were running, and changing direction.

3. This test provides a reliable means to monitor the effect of training on the athlete’s physical development regarding agility. All measurements, inferences, and conclusions based on this test are meaningful and appropriate towards the valid measurements of agility. We conducted our test in a very specific manner. This involved: using the same course each time for each participant to allow us to compare athletes, used the same starting method for everyone, allowed participants to go through the trial once before they ran the live test to ensure that they understood the pattern, and we followed the strict guidelines of running this test that were provided by the source that we found our standards at.

This test is also stable and consistent in measuring what it is intended to measure. However, there are factors that may influence test results. These include the time of day the test is administered, the athlete’s prior test experience/knowledge, accuracy of measurements (distances, times, etc.), inappropriate warm up, skill of the tester, athlete’s clothing/shoes, and surface on which the test is conducted.

5. Examples of sports that require agility in order to obtain success include basketball, football, tennis, and soccer. All of these sports involve athletes changing direction frequently and acceleration plays a vital role in the sports as well.

6. This test requires eight cones, stopwatch, and a tape measure.

7. As I said before this test requires the participant to change direction so the individual needs to know how to plant off of a foot. Another piece of this test is being able to get up from a laying down position, which is what the beginning position of this test is. The fundamental ability to run is also needed for this test. 8. The length of the course is 10 meters and the width (distance between the start and finish points) is 5 meters. Four cones are used to mark the start, finish and the two turning points. Another four cones are placed down the center an equal distance apart.

Each cone in the center is spaced 3.3 meters apart. Subjects should lie on their front

(head to the start line) and hands by their shoulders. On the 'Go' command the stopwatch is started, and the athlete gets up as quickly as possible and runs around the course in the direction indicated, without knocking the cones over, to the finish line, at which the timing is stopped.

9. The scores for this test are based on a national standard that is divided into male and female divisions. Based on the time that it takes for the subject to finish the pattern, their rank is compared to the national standards and put into the groups of: poor, below average, average, above average, and excellent. We also ranked the participants by gender and by class to easily compare where an individual fell within the class average. 10. We have attached a standards sheet along with the results that we have received from our class, these are attached on the last page . These standards were for college athletes (age

18-22). The standards are divided by gender, because typically males are able to complete the course at a faster pace.

11. The set up for this test is simple, but it needs to be done with precision. There are specific measurements that are needed to be able to relate the results to the standards. Make sure that the individual is well rested prior to this test (hasn’t just got done doing another running test right before this test). Make sure that the individual understands the course and understands that if they hit a cone then they must start over. We only tested our subjects once, but more testing would not hurt and may improve scores. I feel that overall we were very precise in our administration of this test. We measure out the course well and we used everyone in our group to make sure that the course was ran correctly and that the time was correct. One weakness was that thee participants were not willing to exert themselves to their full potential and were also not willing to run the course again when given the opportunity.

Overall we feel that we have conducted a very reliable test that accurately portrays the agility level of the subjects that we have tested. If we were to do this test again we would make our participants run the course all out at least twice to get the best possible score.

13. There is a wide variety of agility tests that measure this motor-related fitness component. This includes the shuttle run test, T-test, zig-zag test, and 505 agility tests. All include locomotor skills such as turning ability and sprinting. 14. Based on the results that we have acquired we could put our participants through a training course that is intended to improve footwork and test them after to evaluate their improvement.

Works Cited Agility Run. (2013). Retrieved from PE World: http://www.peworld.org/fitnesstesting/agility_run.htm The Sport + The Science. (2014). Retrieved from Top End Sports: http://www.topendsports.com/testing/tests/illinois.htm