Abstract

The purpose of our study was to find out about the influence of experience in strategy planning by women volleyball players. The study sample was made up of 16 volleyball players: 8 experts (more than 10 years of experience) and 8 novice players (4 years of experience). The strategy planning of spikers in competition was analyzed using the second question in the post-match interview drawn up by McPherson (2000), obtaining information about current thoughts, action possibilities for subsequent points and performance assessment. The codification system devised by McPherson (2000) was used, which consists of three levels of analysis: conceptual content, conceptual sophistication and conceptual structure. The findings showed that the expert players had better thinking processes, greater procedural knowledge, more sophisticated verbalizations and complex structures. Our results have been confirmed by a range of research based on the study of knowledge, sports skill and volleyball.