Weekly External Load in Italian Women's Football Players: Influence of Playing Time

Panascì, M, Rago, V, Ferrando, V, Castagna, C, Ruggeri, P, and Faelli, E. Weekly External Load in Italian Women's Football Players: Influence of Playing Time. J Strength Cond Res XX(X): 000-000, 2026-This study compared external load distribution during the first round of the season between starters (ST) and nonstarters (NS) in Italian professional women's football players. Subjects were 18 players (age: 24.3 ± 3.9 years; height: 167 ± 4.2 cm; body mass: 60.4 ± 5.4 kg) from the same team. External load was measured using global positioning system technology. Variables included total distance (TD), high-speed running distance (19.8-25.2 km·h-1), sprint distance (>25.2 km·h-1), and the number of accelerations (ACC; >3.0 m·s-2) and decelerations (DEC; <-3.0 m·s-2). Nine players were classified as ST, defined as those who played at least 60 minutes in 3 consecutive matches during this phase of the season, whereas the remaining 9 players were classified as NS. Results revealed that NS had significantly higher values of TD (p = 0.001), high-speed running (p = 0.002), ACC (p < 0.001), and DEC (p < 0.001) on MD+2 compared with ST. In addition, NS exhibited significantly greater values of TD (p = 0.003), ACC (p = 0.035), and DEC (p = 0.006) on MD-4 compared with ST. No significant differences were observed between groups on MD-3, MD-2, and MD-1. These findings suggest that NS experienced higher external training loads on MD-4 and MD+2, possibly reflecting compensatory training loads because of limited or no match participation.