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Imagery (IM) is one of the most popular psychological techniques used by athletes and coaches to improve performance at competition level. The aim of the study was to investigate if there were statically significant differences in the use of the imagery modalities of MIQ-3 (kinaesthetic, Visual Internal, Visual External) between futsal and soccer practitioners. Seventeen-three subjects (soccer: n = 24; age = 11.33 ± 0.48 years old; futsal: n = 49; age = 10.08 ± 1.77 years old) volunteered to participate in this study. All the participants had at least two years of regular practice in federated competition. The subjects signed an informed consent form. To assess IM ability, the Portuguese version of MIQ-3 was used. The normality of the data was verified by the Shapiro-Wilk Test. The mean and standard deviation were computed as descriptive statistics. T-test Student and Mann-Whitney tests for independent samples were used to verify differences between groups. Our results demonstrated no significant differences between groups (p > .5), values were higher in futsal practitioners in VI, VE and MIQ-3. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this project consists in creating a new way of structuring Education School Physics lessons, based on a logical whatever pedagogical-didactic, instead of anatomical - physiological way. This plan has been put into practice with students of 4th grade from Padres Redentoristas Social Center, located in Castelo Branco (Portugal) in swimming classes. With this purpose we designed an intervention plan in the water, which consists in four games encouraging them to do it by the good way. As a result, we analyse the results obtained in the planning, intervention and the subsequent hypothetical development of a good game that was carried out. Since due to a series of factors, both personal and external, I have not been able to meet the expectations that I had originally established in my planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this study was to verify whether the application of additional sessions of flexibility training improves this capacity in athletes who practice acrobatic gymnastics. The study included 28 children (10.57 ± 2.5 years), aged between 7 and 15 years of both genders (F, N = 24, 11.00 ± 0.5 years; M, N = 4, 8.00 ± 0.4 years), divided into two groups, experimental group (N = 14, 8.43 ± 1.01) and control group (N = 14, 12.71 ± 1.51). The athletes in the experimental group performed 20 specific training sessions for different types of flexibility over approximately 3 months. The Shapiro-Wilk test was applied to verify normality and the Wilcoxon test (to assess intra-group differences) was used. After analysing the results, we found that although there were not many statistically significant differences, on average the experimental group presented better results after the intervention in the various variables evaluated, whereas the control group presented, on average, and in some of the study variables, little or no evolution. These results agree with the study by (Publio, 1988) who carried out an investigation evaluating the flexibility of Olympic gymnasts through training, where they obtained significant results in gymnasts with an average age of ten years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this study was to verify if there were differences in terms of the development of strength and impulsion of the lower limbs in athletes practicing Acrobatic Gymnastics. In this study participated 12 athletes aged between 10 and 15 years (12.50 ± 0.97) all female, divided into two groups, an Experimental Group (N = 5, 12.40 ± 0.92) and a control group (N = 7, 12.57 ± 0.36). To assess the strength of the lower limbs, the Chronojump software was used and to verify the body composition, the "Inbody" Bioimpedance scale was used. Athletes in the experimental group performed 20 specific training sessions for different types of strength over approximately 3 months. The Shapiro-Wilk test was applied to verify normality and the Wilcoxon test was used (to assess intra-group differences). The main results obtained refer that both groups evolved, however it was the experimental group (subject to complementary training) that obtained better results and greater evolution, with statistically significant differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]