Table 1.

The locomotor characteristics of young rugby union players during match-play within England

Study	Level of play	Age	Position	Sample size (n)	Playing time (min)	Total distance (m)	Average speed (m min−1)
Cunningham et al. [35]	International	U20	Forwards	21 (81)	87.6 ± 9.7	5370 ± 830	61.5 ± 8.0
			Backs	19 (80)	90.4 ± 8.1	6230 ± 800	69.1 ± 7.6
Phibbs et al. [9]	Academy	U18	Forwards	16	62.9 ± 17.8	4128 ± 1232	65.0 ± 5.7
			Backs	15	69.2 ± 0.2	4770 ± 741	69.4 ± 5.5
	School	U18	Forwards	15	61.1 ± 16.9	3884 ± 1255	58.7 ± 8.1
			Backs	15	65.5 ± 14.0	4457 ± 1009	66.9 ± 8.4
Read et al. [5]	School	U16	Forwards	16	62.5 ± 2.3	4364 ± 654	69.7 ± 9.2
			Backs	15	58.8 ± 7.8	3841 ± 700	66.4 ± 9.4
		U18	Forwards	18	66.2 ± 15.5	4232 ± 985	64.2 ± 5.4
			Backs	16	65.7 ± 17.8	4489 ± 1299	68.3 ± 5.7
	University		Forwards	17	70.7 ± 21.4	4683 ± 1377	66.6 ± 5.0
			Backs	14	82.4 ± 10.7	5889 ± 719	71.1 ± 5.5
Read et al. [3]	County	U16	Forwards	20	49.3 ± 18.5	–	77.8 ± 5.4
			Backs	15	52.1 ± 20.3	–	79.8 ± 10.5
		U18	Forwards	21	51.1 ± 19.4	–	74.9 ± 6.8
			Backs	19	52.9 ± 18.4	–	78.7 ± 7.0
		U20	Forwards	18	59.9 ± 22.8	–	65.3 ± 3.2
			Backs	19	61.8 ± 23.2	–	70.9 ± 8.7
Read et al. [30]	Academy	U18	Forwards	7 (21)	76.4 ± 3.7	5461 ± 360	71.7 ± 6.6
			Backs	12 (24)	76.4 ± 3.8	5639 ± 368	74.0 ± 6.6
	School	U18	Forwards	25	74.1 ± 4.1	4881 ± 388	66.0 ± 5.0
			Backs	25	74.2 ± 3.8	5260 ± 441	71.0 ± 5.4
Roe et al. [33]	Academy	U18	Forwards	12 (43)	66.0 ± 13.0	4747 ± 1002	–
			Backs	14 (38)	70.0 ± 11.0	5201 ± 810	–
Roe et al. [32]	Academy	U18	All	14	73.6	4691 ± 878	74.0 ± 6.0

Data are displayed as mean ± SD. Sample size is the number of participants in the study, followed by the total number of observations in brackets if different