Aquatic-Based Tabata training: a training system to improve physical fitness of athletes in situational sports

Purpose: This study aims to investigate the effect of aquatic-based Tabata training on increasing the physical fitness level of athletes in situational sports through a mixed study. Material and methods: This study adopted a quantitative and qualitative (mixed) approach. Research involved participants who were athletes in situational sports, namely martial arts (n=20) football (n=20). Situational sports are sports with a changing situation during competitive activity. These include sports games and martial arts. Participants were allocated into two groups, namely an experimental group that received an aquatic-based Tabata training program and a control group that carried out normal training. Quantitative instruments for measuring physical fitness was leg dynamometer test, squat jumps, 10 meter running tests, shuttle runs, sit and reach and multi-stage. Meanwhile qualitative instrument involved in-depth interviews for 30 minutes. Quantitative statistical analysis used IBM SPSS to obtain normality, descriptive statistics. Meanwhile, the Independent samples t-test used to test differences in physical fitness values between the before and after of experiment. Paired sample t-test serves to test whether there is an effect of the experimental and control groups on the level of physical fitness. Qualitative statistical analysis through thematic, namely coded and categorized into three themes. Results: The first finding in the quantitative study showed that there was no difference in the physical fitness of the experimental and control group athletes before the experiment (p>0.05). The second finding that aquatic-based Tabata training had a significant effect on increasing physical fitness (p<0.05), but there was no increase in physical fitness in the control group (p>0.05). The third finding is that there are differences in the physical fitness of the experimental and control group athletes after getting the experiment (p<0.05). Meanwhile qualitative result shows that the athletes agreed that the aquatic-based Tabata training program was easy, fun and efficient to use and saves time. In addition, they also assumed that this training had a big impact in improving physical fitness, but this training also has challenges, namely it could not be applied to pre-teens athletes and has the risk to cause injury if the athletes were not carried out an optimal warming up and not serious in carrying out the training program. Conclusions: This study concluded that aquatic-based Tabata training was proven to be one of the effective training systems to improve the physical fitness of athletes in situational sports.