Perception of the Sports Social Environment After the Development and Implementation of an Identification Tool for Contagious Risk Situations in Sports During the COVID-19 Pandemic

[Abstract] This study details the methodological process for creating a tool for the identification of COVID-19 potential contagion situations in sports and physical education before, during, and after practice and competition. It is a tool that implies an educational and methodological process with all the agents of the sports system. This tool identifies the large number of interactions occurring through sports action and everything that surrounds it in training, competition, and organization. The aim is to prepare contingency protocols based on an exhaustive analysis, risk detection, and proposal of contingency measures trying to reduce the residual risk to a minimum. In the second part, the results of the implementation of this tool in the sports system of Galicia (Spain) are shown. The technicians have changed their perceptions about the coronavirus transmission in sports. They highlight the problem for returning to sports participation for athletes under 18 years in the pandemic context

Identification Tool for Potential Infectious Situations in Sport: FISICOVID-DXTGALEGO (Xunta de Galicia)

[Resumen] Este trabajo detalla la creación, desarrollo e integración de la herramienta FISICOVID-DXTGALEGO. Su principal objetivo es detectar situaciones de potencial contagio de la COVID-19 en el deporte, así como proponer medidas de contingencia intentando reducir el riesgo residual al mínimo. En el presente artículo se describe el funcionamiento de la misma dentro del sistema deportivo de la comunidad autónoma de Galicia, conformado alrededor de 300 especialidades deportivas en 58 federaciones autonómicas colaborando con la Secretaría Xeral para o Deporte. Se trata de una herramienta que lleva implícito un proceso metodológico y educativo con todos los agentes del sistema deportivo para identificar el gran número de interacciones que se dan en la acción deportiva y todo lo que la rodea en el entrenamiento, la competición y su organización.[Abstract] This work details the creation, development and integration of the FISICOVID-DXTGALEGO tool. Its main objective is to detect situations of potential contagion of COVID-19 in sport, as well as to propose contingency measures trying to reduce residual risk to a minimum. This article describes the operation of the tool within the sports system of the autonomous community of Galicia, made up of 300 sports specialties in 58 regional federations collaborating with the regional sports administration (Secretaría Xeral para o Deporte, Xunta de Galicia). It is a tool that implies a methodological and educational process with all the agents of the sports system to identify the large number of interactions that occur in sports action and everything that surrounds it in training, competition and its organization

Comparison of physical fitness profiles obtained before and during COVID-19 pandemic in two independent large samples of children and adolescents: DAFIS Project

[Abstract]: COVID-19 pandemic restrictions might have negatively affected the health-related physical fitness of children and adolescents. The aim of this study was to contrast the body composition and physical fitness data of two independent samples of children and adolescents obtained from an online database (DAFIS project) before (n = 15,287) and during (n = 2101) the first academic year of the COVID-19 pandemic. The results revealed higher values for the body mass index (p = 0.002), waist circumference (p 0.05). Our data suggested that pandemic constraints might have affected body composition and muscular fitness of children and adolescents. These results might be of interest for designing specific interventions oriented toward counteracting the negative effects of pandemic restrictions on health-related physical fitness

Percentiles and Principal Component Analysis of Physical Fitness From a Big Sample of Children and Adolescents Aged 6-18 Years: The DAFIS Project

[Abstract] Assessing physical fitness has emerged as a proxy of the health status of children and adolescents and therefore as relevant from a public health point of view. DAFIS is a project included in Plan Galicia Saudable (Healthy Galicia Plan) of the regional government of Galicia (Spain). DAFIS consists of an on-line software devoted to record the results of a standard physical fitness protocol carried out as a part of the physical education curriculum. The aims of this study were: to obtain normative values of physical fitness of the Galician school population evaluated in the DAFIS project, and to identify a reduced number of components and tests able to capture a significant amount of the variability in the physical fitness of children and adolescents. From an initial sample of 27784 records, 15287 cases (7543 males, 7744 females) were considered after filtering. Generalized Additive Models for Location, Scale and Shape were used for obtaining percentile curves and tables for each sex. Furthermore, a principal components analysis was performed, selecting the number of components by applying the Kaiser’s rule and selecting a subset of variables considering the correlation between each variable and the components. Percentile curves and normative values are reported for each test and sex. Physical fitness was better in boys than in girls throughout age groups, except for flexibility that was consistently higher in girls. Two main components were detected throughout age groups: the first one representing body composition and partially cardiorespiratory fitness and the second one muscular fitness. For boys and girls, waist to height ratio had the highest correlations with the first component in four out of six age groups. The highest correlation with the second component, was most frequently observed for the handgrip test both in boys and girls (four out of six age groups). This study provides evidence about the utility of school community actions like DAFIS aimed to track the health-related fitness of children and adolescents. The results suggest that fat mass distribution (i.e., waist to height ratio and waist circumference) and muscular performance (mainly handgrip) concentrate a high proportion physical fitness variance