EFFICACY OF GAME SPECIFIC TRAINING IN COMBINATION WITH PLYOMETRIC TRAINING PERFORMED IN DIFFERENT SURFACE CONDITIONS ON SPIKING OF YOUNG VOLLEYBALL PLAYERS

The purpose of the study was to examine the efficacy of game specific training in combination with plyometric training performed on different surface conditions on spiking skill among young volleyball players. To achieve the purpose of the study, forty-five male volleyball players aged between 15 and 18 years were selected and randomly divided into three equal groups of fifteen subjects each. Group-I underwent combined game specific training with plyometric training on sand surface, Group-II underwent combined game specific training with plyometric training on firm surface, and Group-III served as the control group. The experimental groups underwent training for a specified training period, while the control group did not participate in any special training programme. Spiking skill was selected as the dependent variable and assessed before and after the training programme. The collected data were statistically analyzed using paired ‘t’ test, Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA), and Scheffe’s post hoc test at 0.05 level of significance.

The results revealed significant improvement in spiking skill among the experimental groups. The obtained paired ‘t’ ratios for sand surface training and firm surface training groups were 18.41 and 29.43 respectively, which were higher than the required table value of 2.15. The percentage of improvement observed was 28.06% for the sand surface training group and 38.22% for the firm surface training group, whereas the control group showed only 1.43% improvement. The adjusted post-test mean values through ANCOVA were 13.01 for the sand surface group, 15.00 for the firm surface group, and 9.13 for the control group. The obtained ‘F’ ratio of 109.70 was significant at 0.05 level. Scheffe’s post hoc test further indicated that the firm surface plyometric training group showed superior improvement in spiking skill compared to the sand surface plyometric training group.