Abstract

Walking football (WF), the walking version of competitive football (i.e., soccer), is a team-based sport that is popular with middle-aged and older adults. While some research has focused on the potential health benefits of WF participation, little research has focused on evaluating walking fitness tests as correlates (i.e., predictors) of physical work during WF competitions. This study evaluated whether metrics of walking test performance could predict metrics of physiological work measured during match play. Methods: Men’s (n=16; Mean±SD: 49±10 yrs age) and women’s (n=20; Mean±SD: 55±14 yrs age) WF teams from England, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore, all of whom were competing in an international WF tournament in Singapore, were recruited for this study. Participants performed two walking tests: 10m Walk Test to determine maximal walking speed (WSMAX), and the 6-min Walk Test to measure maximal walking distance (6MWTD) in 6 mins. The 6MWTD was also transformed into a predicted maximal oxygen uptake (PVO2MAX). During the tournament the next day, participants wore a neoprene waist pack with an accelerometry-based activity monitor (AM) that was used to derive three metrics from a single competitive match: Total activity counts (ACTOT, counts/match), total steps (STEPSTOT, steps/match), and a sum of MET-minutes (MET-mins/match). Multiple regression procedures were then used to predict the physiological work values (ACTOT, STEPSTOT, MET-mins) from the walking test metrics (WSMAX, 6MWTD, PVO2MAX) (0.05 alpha). Results: Neither 6MWTD nor PVO2MAX were predictive of any physiological work variables (P=0.57-0.97), but WSMAX was highly predictive of all physiological work variables – R2=0.65 for ACTOT, R2=0.54 for STEPSTOT, R2=0.61 for MET-mins – with sex as a covariate. Conclusions: Walking test metrics related to cardiorespiratory fitness were not related to measures of physiological work during WF match play, but the metric of maximal walking speed (WSMAX) seemed to be highly predictive. These results suggest that aerobic walking fitness (i.e., as determined by 6MWTD performance) may be less important than anaerobic bursts of walking speed (i.e., WSMAX) to the needs of competitive WF match play.

Keywords

Fitness, MET, Singapore, Steps, Walking Speed,

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