Abstract
This study proposes the instrumental analysis of the physiological and biomechanical adaptation of football players to a fatigue protocol during the month immediately after the COVID-19 lockdown, to get insights into fitness recovery. Eight male semi-professional football players took part in the study and filled a questionnaire about their activity during the lockdown. At the resumption of activities, the mean heart rate and covered distances during fatiguing exercises, the normalized variations of mean and maximum exerted power in the Wingate test and the Bosco test outcomes (i.e., maximum height, mean exerted power, relative strength index, leg stiffness, contact time, and flight time) were measured for one month. Questionnaires confirmed a light-intensity self-administered physical activity. A significant effect of fatigue (Wilcoxon signed-rank test p < 0.05) on measured variables was confirmed for the four weeks. The analysis of the normalized variations of the aforementioned parameters allowed the distinguishing of two behaviors: downfall in the first two weeks, and recovery in the last two weeks. Instrumental results suggest a physiological and ballistic (i.e., Bosco test outcomes) recovery after four weeks. As concerns the explosive skills, the observational data are insufficient to show complete recovery.
Highlights
The COVID-19 pandemic lockdown has definitely changed the world of sports and football in particular
Results show that all athletes conducted self-administered training sessions with a slightly higher muscular strength training intensity of sessions with respect to aerobic/cardio ones
The survey indicated that the lockdown affected the training habits of athletes that continued with self-administered training sessions after the team activities resumed
Summary
The COVID-19 pandemic lockdown has definitely changed the world of sports and football in particular. Because of strict safety measures adopted by football clubs, athletes in Italy underwent a two-month forced rest period without any form of agonistic training, which is an extremely peculiar situation from a both physical and psychological point of view. It is well established that the reduction in physical activity leads to the loss of muscle mass and a consequent increase in fat mass [3,4,5,6]. In this scenario, it is reasonable to state that the balance of the aforementioned phenomenon
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