Autoregulating jump performance to induce functional overreaching

The purpose of this study was to determine whether autoregulating jump performance using the minimal individual difference (MID) associated with countermovement jump (CMJ) height could be used to regulate and monitor a training phase that elicited functional overreaching and tapering in team sport athletes. The participants were familiarized with the jump and then the CMJ height reliability was quantified to determine the MID. Countermovement jump height was assessed in the pretesting session (T0), at the end of 4 weeks of intensified training (T1), and after 2 weeks of tapering (T2). Eighteen national level U17 male futsal players were randomly allocated into the regulated group (RG; n 9) and the control group (CG; n 9). The RG performed 6 weeks of training with the training load regulated by mean height of CMJ with MID, whereas the CG performed the preplanned training. The differences between groups and across time points were compared by a 2-way analysis of variance. In the RG, the MID loading was increased in weeks 3 and 4 (8.2 and 14.5%, respectively; p \u3c 0.001) compared with the preplanned loading of the CG during the overreaching phase. In the jump results, the RG significantly (p ≤ 0.05) reduced CMJ height during T1 (effect size [ES] -0.31; 95% confidence interval [CI]: -0.58 to -0.02); however, there were no significant changes in the CG jump height at T1 and T2. At T2, the RG significantly increased CMJ height above baseline (ES 0.30; 95% CI: 0.09 to 0.51). Researchers and practitioners could use this autoregulating method to regulate and monitor training load to achieve functional overreaching in youth futsal player