Concurrent validity and reliability of a time of-flight camera on measuring muscle’s mechanical properties during sprint running

Recent advancements in 3D data gathering have made it possible to measure the distance to an object at different time stamps through the use of time-of-flight cameras. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate the validity and reliability of a time-of-flight camera on different mechanical sprint properties of the muscle. Fifteen male football players performed four 30m maximal sprint bouts which was simultaneously recorded with a time-of-flight camera and 1080 sprint device. By using an exponential function on the collected positional- and velocity-time data from both the devices, following variables were derived and analyzed: Maximal velocity (nmax), time constant (t), theoretical maximal force (F0), theoretical maximal velocity (V0), peak power output (Pmax), F-V mechanical profile (Sfv) and decrease in ratio of force (Drf). The results showed strong correlation in vmax along with a fairly small standard error of estimate (SEE) (r = 0,817, SEE = 0,27 m/s), while t displayed moderate correlation and relatively high SEE (r = 0,620, SEE = 0,12 s). Furthermore, moderate mean bias (>5%) were revealed for most of the variables, except for vmax and V0. The within-sessions reliability using Intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and standard error of measurement (SEM) ranged from excellent to poor with Pmax displaying excellent reliability (ICC = 0,91, SEM = 72W), while vmax demonstrated moderate reliability (ICC = 0,61, SEM = 0,26 m/s) and t poor(ICC = 0,44, SEM = 0,11 s). In conclusion, these findings showed that in its current state, the time-of-flight camera is not a reliable or valid device in estimating different mechanical properties of the muscle during sprint running using Samozino et al’s computations. Further development is needed