Visual and athletic skills training enhance sport performance

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of 8 weeks visual and skills training on visual skills and athletic skills among novice table tennis and basketball players. Sixty novice male were randomly divided into 6 groups (1visual training and basketball lay-up, 2visual training and table tennis forehand derive, 3basketball lay-up, 4table tennis forehand derive, 5visual training and 6control). Based on their training, Revien and Gabor (1981) visual training and athletic skill drills were used. Before and after 8 weeks training, we used from 6 visual skill tests and athletic training tests. The results have shown that all of the experimental groups had enhancement in their visual skills and athletic skills based on their training. Visual and table tennis group had better performance in comparison with visual and basketball group. It seems that the combination of visual and athletic skills training is better than exclusive athletic and visual training. Also the nature of sport skills and their visual demands can affect the visual training programming.