This study aimed to determine kinematic and kinetic key performance indicators (KPI) of swimming turn performance using principal component analysis (PCA) and multiple linear regression analysis and provide reference values using percentiles. Touch and tumble turn performances of male (; n; = 68) and female (; n; = 48) Swiss national team members from three age categories-adult (20.2 ± 2.7 yrs, 790 ± 57 points), junior (16.2 ± 0.8 yrs, 729 ± 53 points) and youth swimmers (14.4 ± 1.0 years of age, 667 ± 53 World Aquatics swimming points, respectively)-were assessed with a motion analysis system equipped with a force plate on the pool wall, one over- and four underwater cameras sampling forces at 500 Hz and footages at 100 Hz. The PCA reduced the 27 original variables by up to 15% depending on turn type and age category using Varimax component loading of >0.6 and explained up to 91% of the total variance. The highest Varimax component loadings for each principal component were used to determine KPI for each turn type and age category using multiple-regression analysis with total turn time as dependent variable. These KPI should be used to interpret turn performances and identify individual swimmers' strengths, weaknesses and future potentials with the help of the percentiles as reference values.
Sport is an area of life that is strongly driven by the desire for performance which can encourage athletes to neglect their health and wellbeing. It is therefore not surprising that research on mental health in sport has found prevalence of diagnosable psychiatric disorders ranging from 4% to 68% (Elbe & Nylandsted Jensen, 2016). Thriving describes a combination of high well-being (i.e., flourishing) and a sustained high level of performance (Brown et al., 2018) and could therefore be an ideal term to promote both in this kind of environment. The purpose of this poster is to provide a conceptual framework indicating coaches’ fields of action for the promotion of athletes’ mental health, well-being and performance (i.e., thriving). Literature on the promotion of mental health and wellbeing within the sport setting was searched and critically reviewed. In this evaluation two sources were found to be especially helpful as foundation of such a conceptual framework. One source was a scoping review investigating risk and protective factors for mental health in elite athletes (Kuettel & Larsen, 2020). The second article presented a conceptual model for mental health and performance of North American athletes (Ayala et al., 2022). The new framework defines six areas in which coaches have primary responsibility for promoting the thriving of their athletes (i.e., mental health stigma; mental health literacy; social support and team relationship; psychological needs satisfaction; intentional practice with a strong focus on injury and overtraining prevention; career management). In three other areas coaches have a supporting role (i.e., self-awareness; mindfulness; set back and stress management including psychological skills training). The proposed conceptual framework can be used to enable coaches to strengthen flourishing and performance of their athletes in a proactive manner.
