Strobe training involves an athlete wearing strobe glasses while performing simple to complex tasks. It is a form of deprivation training aimed towards increasing an athlete’s ability to anticipate and their reaction time to specific stimuli. Studies have been done that show how strobe training can benefit an athlete’s performance where trajectory anticipation and fast reaction time are needed. Although strobe training is relatively new, the short-term benefits have proven to be extremely promising if combined with the right training.

What strobe training entails is having the athlete wear a pair of strobe glasses that alternates between clear and opaque lenses at a frequency determined by the trainer. The athlete is then set to do specific activity (training period) – preferably an action or activity that is applicable to in-game play. Studies have shown that as little as 5-7 minutes of strobe training can show marked improvements afterwards. However, this improvement is not sustained more than 24 hours after the training. It is important to note that longer sessions of strobe training have not been studied to see if the effects last longer.

Studies have shown that strobe training can speed up an athlete’s anticipatory timing, reduce errors in anticipatory timing, improve motion detection, central (visual field) attention, improved ability to retain visual information in short-term memory, and general improvements in higher-level visual cognition. More studies need to be done on how strobe training can be integrated into training regimens for athletes, but so far it seems quite promising.

Wink is super excited to bring this to Burnaby and work with athletes to improve their skills. We will let you guys know as soon as this is available!