title: Validity of a reactive agility test for Australian football.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To study the validity of a video-based reactive agility test in Australian footballers.
  
  
  METHODS
  15 higher performance, 15 lower performance, and 12 nonfootballers completed a light-based reactive agility test (LRAT), a video-based reactive agility test (VRAT), and a planned test (PLAN).
  
  
  RESULTS
  With skill groups pooled, agility time in PLAN (1346 ± 66 ms) was significantly faster (P = .001) than both reactive tests (VRAT = 1550 ± 102 ms; LRAT = 1572 ± 97 ms). In addition, decision time was significantly faster (P = .001; d = 0.8) in LRAT (278 ± 36 ms) than VRAT (311 ± 47 ms). The correlation in agility time between the two reactive tests (r = .75) was higher than between the planned and reactive tests (r = .41-.68). Higher performance players had faster agility and movement times on VRAT (agility, 130 ± 24 ms, d = 1.27, P = .004; movement, 69 ± 73 ms, d = 0.88, P = .1) and LRAT (agility, 95 ± 86 ms, d = 0.99, P = .08; movement, 79 ± 74 ms; d = 0.9; P = .08) than the nonfootballers. In addition, higher (55 ± 39 ms, d = 0.87, P = .05) and lower (40 ± 57 ms, d = 0.74, P = .18) performance groups exhibited somewhat faster agility time than nonfootballers on PLAN. Furthermore, higher performance players were somewhat faster than lower performance for agility time on the VRAT (63 ± 85 ms, d = 0.82, P = .16) and decision time on the LRAT (20 ± 39 ms, d = 0.66, P = .21), but there was little difference in PLAN agility time between these groups (15 ± 150 ms, d = 0.24, P = .8).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Differences in decision-making speed indicate that the sport-specific nature of the VRAT is not duplicated by a light-based stimulus. In addition, the VRAT is somewhat better able to discriminate different groups of Australian footballers than the LRAT. Collectively, this indicates that a video-based test is a more valid assessment tool for examining agility in Australian footballers.
authors.affiliation: School of Sport Science, Exercise and Health, University of Western Australia, Crawley Perth, WA, Australia.
authors.forename: Greg
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Henry
authors.forename: Brian
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Dawson
authors.forename: Brendan
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Lay
authors.forename: Warren
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Young
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D054874:Athletic Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D005080:Exercise Test; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009043:Motor Activity / Q000502:physiology; D009048:Motor Skills / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology*; D012916:Soccer / Q000502:physiology*; D014739:Victoria; D014741:Video Recording