Total distance is the foundational tracking metric for athletic performance defined by the overall quantity of work an athlete must undertake in order to excel at the highest levels of their sport.
Accumulating distance over the course of a match drains a competitor’s overall level of energy by fatiguing muscles and stressing the cardiovascular system. Within a tournament, total distance covered becomes most significant not on one specific day, but as a cumulative measure. For world-class athletes, handling high-distance loads in one match is not the primary challenge; rather, it’s the ability to sustain repeated exposure to high-distance matches in a condensed, one-week span and still produce peak performance.
Cumulative distance covered leading into semi-finals can be vastly different for two opponents. A disparity in the amount of distance covered in the previous rounds could result in an advantage for the fresher player. In 2021, Carlos Alcaraz came into the final having run close to 18 per cent less distance than Sebastian Korda. The following year the tables were turned for Brandon Nakashima. Nakashima came into the finals having run 19 per cent more distance in his first four matches than his opponent Jiri Lehecka.
In 2021, Lorenzo Musetti covered a distance of 2.48 km against Hugo Gaston, the most distance of any player in any match during the 21-and-under event in 2021. Gaston ran 2.28 km in the same match, the second-most distance of any match that year.
The Science Behind Workload in Tennis
Total distance is the primary metric that measures the overall volume of work by aggregating how much ground an athlete has covered. Mechanical workload is the secondary volume metric that aggregates the total amount of weighted accelerations and decelerations the athlete has performed. Using optical tracking systems, every instant of acceleration and deceleration performed by a player is categorised into one of three zones: low, medium or high.
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