Needs Analysis

A needs analysis is the process of determining what qualities are necessary for the athlete, the sport, or a combination of both.

Doing an in-depth needs analysis allows a fitness professional to identify what physical qualities are most important for their athlete to perform well in their sport. It also provides an injury analysis of the sport and helps to tailor training towards preventing such injuries.

On top of all this, analysing the physical profile of the athlete helps the coach understand the strength and weaknesses of their athlete, and highlights where the majority of the training time should be spent.

A comprehensive needs analysis will cover both the needs of the sport and the needs of the athlete.

Why should you do a needs analysis?

It has been consistently proven that well-designed physical training programmes can reduce injury rates and improve athletic performance. As a result, it is the primary responsibility of the fitness professional to ensure both these training objectives are achieved.

The only way to ensure a training programme will be successful is to conduct an extensive needs analysis on the sport and the individual.

Format of a needs analysis

A needs analysis is often conducted in 3 parts:

• Section 1 - Sport-orientated needs analysis
• Section 2 - Profiling the athlete (athlete-orientated analysis)
• Section 3 - Comparative analysis

Identifying the demands of the sport is often done first, as this allows the fitness professional to identify what qualities the athlete needs to possess to perform well in that sport. 

A sport-orientated needs analysis will look at the specific demands of that sport. For example:

• The duration of the sport – are there any stoppages/rest times?
• Location –  is it land-based or water-based?
• The structure – competition schedule, individual or team-based sport?
• Competition level (i.e. professional or amateur)
• Average distances covered
• Positional requirements – speed, strength, power, agility, kicking, throwing
• Equipment – bats, racquets, sticks, protective padding

Injuries analysis

Consider common injuries in that sport and position, injury frequency, average time-loss from particular injuries, time of year injuries, surfaces, and predisposing factors (e.g. previous injury). This stage requires research.

Here's a typical example of injury analysis:

Study Summary by Adam Virgile, 2020, © Adam Virgile.

Biomechanical (kinematic and kinetic) analysis

What are the important biomechanical factors influencing the sport?

• Kinematics of the sport – sprinting, jogging, walking, shuffling, lateral shuffling, sitting, twisting, jumping (one-leg/ two-leg), throwing, balancing, lunging, and tackling.
• Kinetics of the sport – all force-time, power-time, and velocity-time characteristics (e.g. peak force, rate of force development, eccentric rate of force development, impulse, ground contact time, torque, peak power output, average power output, peak velocity, time to peak velocity, and average velocity).

Here's an example of a biomechanical analysis of alpine skiing performance:

Important factors influencing alpine skiing performance

Turning technique:

• carving
• skidding

Kinematics:

• racing time
• trajectory and speed

Kinetics:

• ground reaction forces
• air drag and ski-snow friction
• energy dissipation

Ski equipment:

• skis
• lift plates, bindings and boots
• poles
• racing suits, protective devices and wearable technologies

Tactics:

• external conditions
• abilities

Biomechanical determinants of the performance of Olympic alpine skiers by Matej Supej and Hans-Christer Holmberg, 2019, © Matej Supej and Hans-Christer Holmberg

The following table is an example of biomechanical analysis for basketball:

Other types of sport needs analysis

Other analyses can include aerobic analysis (e.g. average heart rate, maximum heart rate, VO2 max, average VO2, and total distance) and anaerobic analysis (e.g. lactate threshold, anaerobic capacity, anaerobic power, the total number of sprints, sprints per minute, high-intensity running, total jumps, the total number of direction changes.)

The aim of all this information is to dissect the sport into manageable segments so that the strength and conditioning coach or sports scientist can prescribe a more accurate, and hopefully more beneficial training programme (Walker, 2016).

Potential issues in gathering data

Issues with conducting a sports-orientated needs analysis can arise due to a lack of information on a particular sport. This is often due to limited research data and can make performing a sports-orientated needs analysis harder. Data may be in research-based journals and either inaccessible or trickier to obtain. Often you can access abstracts that provide summaries and figures/tables for free. You may also find the authors are happy to share their work if you contact them directly.

An overwhelming quantity of information may lead to over-complication. In such scenarios, you should decide what the primary objectives of the programme are, and avoids over-complicating things. Stick to the simple, yet effective principles of training.

Once you have established the demands of the sport, you need to identify what skills and characteristics the athlete currently possess and what they need to work on to perform well in the sport and minimise injury. Establishing a baseline of what skills are needed for a specific sport, allows you to target testing and the athlete needs analysis. E.g. If the sport were a 100m sprint, you would identify that speed is an essential component for performing well. Therefore, you should make sure to assess the athlete's speed to identify current ability and opportunities for improvement.

Athlete needs analysis

An athlete-orientated needs analysis assesses the athlete’s current physical profile – i.e. age, gender, weight, strength, speed, and power. Profiling the athlete will include performance testing to identify their strengths and weaknesses.

Examples of data to consider include:

• Their position (e.g. goal attack)
• Competitive level (e.g. professional)
• Date of birth
• Gender
• Height
• Weight
• Height-weight ratio
• BMI
• Body fat
• Age
• Athlete’s injury history
• Athlete’s strengths and weaknesses (e.g. power, acceleration, balance, mobility, flexibility)

The analysis must also consider:

• Athlete goals
• Coach’s goals for the athlete

(Walker, 2016)

An athlete needs analysis includes capturing the athlete's requirements and goals, performing fitness tests, analysing the data, and recommending the most effective strategy for the training programme. Fitness programmes must be tailored to individual clients, including their current fitness levels and where they are in the stages of change model. You'll need to make note of any present or past injuries that may impact training, and the client's exercise background, including prior training (Parchmann, 2020.)

Comparative needs analysis

Once the information has been gathered on both the sport and the athlete, it's time to compare the 2 and identify how the athlete compares to the common profile of the athletes in that sport.

This table provides an example of how this comparative analysis may be performed for elite male basketball players.

Watch

Nick Jankovskis explains his method for analysing any sport.

Let's look at a needs analysis for elite badminton players.

Sports analysis

A typical modern-day badminton game lasts for around 40-50 minutes. A match consists of a maximum of 3 sets to 21 points. A player must win 2 sets out of three to win a match.

Important requirements for an elite badminton player include:

• Speed – the ability to accelerate quickly to get to the shuttlecock
• Agility – the ability to stop quickly, change direction and backtrack
• Flexibility – overhead reach and forward lunging with reach are critical abilities
• Muscular endurance – the ability to repeat these movements over a 40-50 minute timeframe
• Power – to jump, leap and create velocity on the shuttlecock – e.g. during a smash
• Coordination – to get your racquet head in the right place at the right time to return a shot

Normative data from the sport

• The work-to-rest ratio is 1:2. For every 6 seconds of action (average rally time), there are 12 seconds of rest.
• The average running distance in an elite singles match is 6.3km.
• While badminton is fast-paced and made up of short movements, it is still primarily aerobic (60% aerobic, 40% anaerobic). The average movement speed is 5.4 to 6.3 km/h and maximum speeds are over 20km/h.
• A badminton player has to make more than 300 changes in their body position adjustment range of more than 90 degrees during a game.

Athlete needs analysis

Fitness tests for elite badminton players include:

• Lower body power – Vertical jump and standing broad jump
• Upper body power – Overhead med ball throw
• Aerobic test – Incremental badminton aerobic test 
• Speed and agility – General movement speed test, 10 x lateral movements across a badminton court (width), back and forward

The incremental badminton aerobic test is a 17-stage test, similar to a beep test. The court is set up as illustrated:

Players start in the central box then shuttle out and back in again in a set order to the corners where they touch the strings of the racquet on a pole, or perform a badminton shot motion. The pace is determined by a recording and gets faster each stage. If a player misses a contact point during a stage, they are given one warning and are eliminated on the next miss.

The speed and agility test is a general movement test. The player starts in the centre of the court and there are 10 shuttlecocks placed at intervals along the side-line. The player must side step from one side of court to the other, knocking the shuttlecocks off the line with their racquet. Their score is the time it takes to knock all shuttlecocks off the line and return to the centre.

Other normative data includes:

Fitness test normative data:

Ben is back to talk you through different training methods. Part of a needs analysis is figuring out what training methods or types are helpful when working with athletes. This video discusses:

• Fartlek
• HIIT
• Crossfit
• SAQ
• Boxing
• Olympic lifting
• Plyometric training
• Yoga

The video is about 12 minutes long. Take notes. The information in these videos will help you with your Exercise Prescription assessment and future programme design.