Sports Vision Performance

Most people who play sport professionally or as a pastime take their vision for granted and may or may not attend eye examinations every year or every two years as recommended.

At one level, sports vision performance includes the wearing of contact lenses rather than glasses for such sports as football, rugby, hockey, tennis, table-tennis, running, athletics or martial arts.

The advantage of wearing contact lenses when playing such sports is that unlike glasses contact lenses are not likely to ‘steam up’ or fall off or get broken whilst playing and also may give better vision.

At another level glasses are more suitable for sports such as squash and badminton as they offer a degree of protection from the squash ball and a shuttlecock respectively so protecting the wearer from eye injury.

In other sports such as competitive shooting, specialist shooting glasses can be worn which allow the non-sighting eye to be covered. This is achieved by means of a specialised ‘occluder’ attached to the glasses so covering the one eye and allowing more comfortable and accurate shooting.

Other interventions as regards sports vision performance include ‘vision training’ activities to improve focussing, eye coordination and speed and accuracy of eye movements as well as peripheral awareness.

Eye health professionals in particular in America and Belgium have worked with tennis players to improve their performance using vision training techniques.

In the UK work has been done with professional football players such as that done by the late Gail Stephenson who for many years worked with Manchester United football club.

Optometrists have also worked with American NFL players, players in the MLB, that is Major League Baseball and the NBA, the National Basketball Association.

Optometrists have also worked with Rugby Union teams, notably the England and France national teams, cricket teams such as the England cricket team and field hockey teams such as the Australian Men and Women’s National squads.

There has also been work done with Olympic squads such as the Spanish Olympic shooting team and the US Olympic volleyball squad.

Interestingly research has shown that such vision training interventions are only statistically significant in terms of performance when dealing with elite competitors.

However much work has been done with players on the fringes of these squads as they are motivated to make the squad and be selected.

So if you are an elite athlete or near elite level vision training will potentially improve your performance though if you are not near elite standard the effects may not be statistically significant.