How wearables are key a part of Daniil Medvedev’s quest for enchancment | ATP Tour

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How wearables are key a part of Medvedev’s quest for enchancment

Study concerning the position of innovation inside Workforce Medvedev

November 14, 2024

Daniil Medvedev stands 6’6”, however doesn’t transfer like a participant that tall. His court docket protection helped him climb to No. 1 within the PIF ATP Rankings in 2022.

Much more goes into that than onerous work. Gilles Cervara and the remainder of Medvedev’s workforce drill down to each obtainable element utilizing wearables to push the boundaries of how properly they’ll put together the 28-year-old for motion.

“It began in 2020 once we had the plan to enhance Daniil’s preparation. One in all our teammates got here from different sports activities, particularly rugby and soccer, so he had expertise with GPS,” Cervara informed ATPTour.com, referring to wearables. “He gave us the concept to make use of it for observe as a result of at the moment, we couldn’t use it in matches to have numbers of our totally different practices after which to match with matches.

“For matches we didn’t have numbers from GPS, we couldn’t, however we created our personal evaluation to have numbers of the totally different actions. After which from these analyses, we put the GPS on throughout practices, throughout units or matches in observe, to even have numbers to match.”

The thought was to create what Cervara known as a “worst-case state of affairs”. What could be the hardest state of affairs Medvedev would face on court docket? In that state of affairs, what number of instances would he want to vary route? What number of instances would he must dash? At what pace?

“From that we created our personal practices to push him to this similar restrict and it turns into a spotlight,” Cervara mentioned. “We [know if we] work sufficient or we didn’t work sufficient to achieve our targets. [We look at the] numbers we have to attain to achieve the identical [output] as a Grand Slam match.”

In line with Cervara, the 2019 ATP Coach of the Yr, it’s not solely concerning the bodily aspect of efficiency, however all the things that goes into thriving in an prolonged match.

“The worst-case state of affairs may very well be to play 5 hours or 5 hours and a half,” Cervara mentioned. “That’s what he skilled in opposition to Nadal, in opposition to so many gamers. And through these matches we have to know what number of sprints or modifications of instructions.”

Earlier than wearables have been obtainable, Cervara took so long as 10 hours to make comparable analyses of matches. Now it has develop into a lot simpler for Cervara to find out about his participant’s efforts and optimise practices to attain peak efficiency.

“[We know] if we would like him to be ready for these sort of matches, then we have to do that, this and this throughout practices, so let’s create these practices,” Cervara mentioned. “We created these practices after which after the observe, with the GPS, we might verify if he made the quantity of sprints and modifications of route he must do through the match.

“It’s simply to verify, ‘Okay, when he’s going to be confronted with a five-hour match in opposition to Sinner or earlier than, Novak and Nadal, we have to ensure that he made it throughout observe, that he’s ready for this’. And it’s not solely throughout preseason. It’s throughout all of the yr, consistently.”

With out these improvements, Cervara mentioned he wouldn’t really have the ability to make measurements. The Frenchman mentioned it could simply be about really feel. He added: “We want goal numbers”.

Now, wearables are almost a every day a part of Medvedev’s routine. Though the previous No. 1 within the PIF ATP Rankings doesn’t utilise them in matches — regardless of ATP guidelines permitting it — Cervara defined the significance of utilizing them in observe.

“You’re in a position to say, ‘Okay, this observe we made this quantity of photographs, this quantity of serves. We made this depth or this variety of sprints or this distance day-after-day’,” Cervara mentioned. “Whenever you use it day-after-day for 5 years, you virtually know straightaway with out GPS what it’s going to be.”

ATP Chief Sporting Officer Ross Hutchins mentioned: “As a Tour, we’re dedicated to driving the game ahead by means of innovation. That is why we launched wearables, which have been permitted for in-competition use earlier this yr. It is essential to offer gamers with the instruments to purpose to boost their efficiency and forestall harm. We sit up for persevering with to help them in gaining perception and maximising their careers.”

Cervara has made information from wearables key to his preparation as a result of it permits him to know precisely what’s going on together with his participant.

“It simply gave me a transparent imaginative and prescient of what we do day-after-day, a transparent imaginative and prescient of what Daniil can expertise on court docket throughout matches,” Cervara mentioned. “It offers you a transparent imaginative and prescient, is extra goal and it helps so much. That’s the principle factor. It helps so much to create good practices to arrange the participant for the fact of matches.”