The effect of a period of functional training on skill and physical characteristics in adolescent female volleyball players

Nowadays, functional training is used as a novel method for athletes, especially volleyball players. As a result, the aim of this study was to investigate the effect of a period of functional training on skills and physical fitness of teenage female volleyball players. To do this, twenty-three 12-14-year-old girls were voluntarily selected to participate in the study. The participants were divided into two control (n = 10) (13 ± 0.66, 160/10±6/06cm, 56/25±11/2kg) and experimental groups (n = 13) (13/53 ± 0.66, 163/46±6/8cm and 59/32 ± 10/07kg). The exercises were done in this order: four weeks, three sessions, two hours progressively. The variables included  RET test, a specialized test of volleyball, professional agility, run-up jump, and proprioception, measured according to the determined protocol before the exercises and after the final training session .The results of co-variance analysis for exercise group (in comparison with the control group) indicated the significant improvement of RET (16.41% and 4.93%) (P≤0/05), significant decrease of professional agility (20.61%) (P≤0/05), significant increase of high jump (7.05%) and proprioception (90.40% in the right leg and 93.04% in the left leg) (P≤0/05) after a month of functional exercises. Overall, the current study revealed that doing functional training for a month can be a vital factor in improving skill and physical fitness in teenage female volleyball players.