Fitness testing and data

Fitness tests produce data. There are two kinds:

• Quantitative data is numbers that can be measured: a time, a distance, a level or a count. Example: 9.5 on the multi-stage fitness test.
• Qualitative data is descriptions and opinions, in words: how hard a session felt, or a coach's comments on technique.

Quantitative data is easy to compare and to put in tables and graphs. Qualitative data explains how the performer felt or why something happened.

Test results are useful when they're compared:

• With normative data: typical results for people of the same age and sex, which show whether a result is excellent, average or poor.
• With earlier results: testing before and after a training programme shows progress, and whether the training is working.

Results can also show a performer's strengths and weaknesses, help set goals, and motivate them.

The tables on this page are practice ratings written for this app. Real ratings vary from source to source, so use your teacher's tables for your own results.

Multi-stage fitness test, level reached (practice ratings for 15 to 16-year-olds, written for this app):

Sit and reach, centimetres past the toes (practice ratings, written for this app):

• A test is reliable if it gives the same result when it's repeated in the same way. To make a test reliable, use the same equipment, the same conditions, the same tester and a proper warm-up each time.
• A test is valid if it measures what it says it measures. The sit and reach test is valid for the flexibility of the hamstrings and lower back, but not for the shoulders.

Example: a 30 m sprint timed by hand with a stopwatch is less reliable than one timed with timing gates, because people press the button at slightly different moments.

A 15-year-old girl did these tests before and after an 8-week training programme. The data was written for this app.

1. Using the practice ratings, what was her rating on each test before and after?
2. Which test improved more, by rating?

Answers: multi-stage fitness test, average before and good after; sit and reach, average before and good after. Both moved up one rating, so by rating they improved equally.