Session-RPE for quantifying load of different youth taekwondo training sessions

BACKGROUND: The session rating of perceived exertion (session-RPE) proved to be a valuable method to quantify the internal training load (ITL) in taekwondo. However, no study validated this method in youth taekwondo athletes performing different training sessions. Thus this study aimed at evaluating the reliability of the session-RPE to monitor the ITL of prepubescent taekwondo athletes during pre-competitive (PC) and competitive (C) training sessions. METHODS: Five female (age: 12.0\ub10.7 y; height: 1.54\ub10.08 m; body mass: 48.8\ub17.3 kg) and four male (age: 12.0\ub10.8 yrs; height: 1.55\ub10.07 m; body mass: 47.3\ub15.3 kg) taekwondo athletes were monitored during 100 individual sessions (PC: N.=33; C: N.=67). The Edwards' HR method was used as reference measure of ITL; the CR-10 RPE scale was administered at 1- and 30-minutes from the end of each session. RESULTS: No difference for gender emerged. The ITLs of C (Edwards: 228\ub140 arbitrary units, AU) resulted higher than that of PC (192\ub126 AU; P=0.04). Although all training typologies and data collections achieved significant correlations between Edwards' and session-RPE methods, a large relationship (r =0.71, P