The purpose of this study was to determine the state of the art in the area of virtual reality in competitive athletes of different levels of expertise in various disciplines and point the areas of its application. Articles published before August 2018 were considered in our review. The PubMed, SCOPUS, SportDiscus and Medline databases were searched. A combination of the following search terms was used: virtual reality, virtual environment, virtual system, athletes, sports, physical training, sport performance, physical exercises. Studies involved healthy competitive athletes. A total of 18 articles met the inclusion criteria. There were three areas of application of virtual reality to sport: performance analysis, simulation improvement and virtual training. Competitive athletes were mostly examined in a semi‐immersive setting. In conclusion, virtual reality seems to play a marginal role in competitive athletes’ training. Due to the fact that virtual reality interventions bring significant improvements in clinical research, well‐designed randomized control trials with detailed virtual training programmes are required in the future. Practically, virtual reality is effectively and commonly used to analyse performance in competitive athletes. There is still a need of creating fully interactive VR, where athletes will be able to cooperate with a virtual partner and influence the environment.

Introduction: Little is known about the early stage balance changes in PD. Many clinicians assume that there are no postural issues in early PD because of failure to identify them on bedside and clinical testing. Here, we quantify balance changes in early and moderate stage PD and compared these values to healthy controls (HC) using clinical assessments of balance and posturography. Methods: We compared 15 HC with 15 early PD (PD-II; Hoehn and Yahr stage II) and 15 moderate PD (PD-III; H&Y stage III). Participants performed various clinical tests of balance and a standing postural task on a force platform. We quantified the spatiotemporal parameters of the center of pressure (COP), the sample entropy and power spectral density (PSD) of the COP. Results: The PSD of the COP differentiated PD-II from HC from 0–0.5 Hz and PD-II from PD-III from 0.5–1 Hz. Specifically, PD-II and PD-III manifested greater power than HC from 0–0.5 Hz, whereas PD-III exhibited greater power than PD-II and HC from 0.5–1.0 Hz (p0.05). Although the sample entropy was significantly lower in the PD groups (p<0.05), entropy failed to differentiate PD-II from PD-III. Conclusion: The low-frequency modulation of the COP in this small cohort differentiated early PD from HC and from moderate PD. Clinicians should be aware that there are early balance deficits in PD. A larger sample size is needed to confirm these findings.

Our aim was to observe, through objective testing using an assessment module incorporated in a new exergaming system, whether elderly people’s static and functional balance is improved by a balance exergaming training program based on movements performed in everyday life. Thirteen healthy elderly women participated in 12 sessions of balance-based exergaming training (three times a week, 30 min per session). All objective outcomes, the quiet standing test, functional balance test (FBT), and limit of stability (LOS) test, were measured on three occasions: before intervention, after six training sessions, and after the completion of the four-week program. The results showed a significant improvement in LOS performance after the intervention. In FBT, participants exhibited a significant decrease (p < 0.01; Kendall’s W = 0.5) in the average time to target hit after six trainings. The average center of pressure velocity increased after six and 12 sessions, however did not reach significance (p = 0.053); nevertheless the size of the effect was large (η_p2 = 0.22). The parameters of the quiet standing test were not significantly affected by the training. The results support the need for more definite and objective studies assessing exergaming for balance in elderly.

Tissue flossing is an increasingly popular method in physiotherapy and sports. There is a belief that tissue flossing can improve range of motion and muscle strength, shorten muscle recovery time, and reduce the risk of injury. The aim of this study was to analyse the effectiveness of tissue flossing for immediately improving muscle strength in recreational athletes when it is performed during warm-up. All participants were randomly assigned to either an experimental group (n = 36) or a control group (n = 34) using a random number generator. The experimental group (n = 36) performed an intervention comprising exercises with muscle tissue flossing and exercises without flossing. The control group (n = 30) performed the same protocol without a floss band. Muscle strength was measured for knee flexion end extension at three speeds (60, 120, and 180 °/s) 3 times. Analysed parameters include peak torque, work, and power related to body weight, flexors–extensors ratio, and time to peak torque. There were no significant changes in the muscle strength parameters from before to after the warm-up in either group (p > 0.05). Significantly lower values of peak torque, work, and power were observed in the experimental group during the warm-up with the floss band applied to muscles (p < 0.05). No clinically significant changes in time to peak torque or flexors–extensors ratio were observed. A single application of flossing does not improve muscle strength or power and can even reduce individuals’ maximum muscle strength capabilities.