Manatee High School in Bradenton, Fla. is known for its rich football tradition, having won five state championships and produced numerous collegiate and professional players throughout its 112-year history.

Currently, the school’s football team is coached by Yusuf Shakir. Since taking the helm in 2017, Shakir implemented Catapult’s PLAYERTEK Team technology to help his athletes better understand their performance and keep improving during their time at Manatee. Catapult is the world leader in sports performance tracking devices and their PLAYERTEK application is a combination of a sensor device and web-based software that measures physical performance during workouts. It includes an advanced GPS designed specifically for football as well as a range of smart sensors.

As for the reason Manatee began using PLAYERTEK, Shakir says, “I wanted my players to be able to see the level they practiced at every day so they could become better athletes. I wanted to help us practice more efficiently and keep our players fresh.”

PLAYERTEK produces several different metrics for coaches and training staffs to analyze, but the ones Shakir sees as being most beneficial to his team are total distance covered and sprint distance during games. As part of his program, Shakir makes sure that his athletes wear the devices during every session and that he reports on the PLAYERTEK numbers each day so he can receive the most accurate and updated data.

“Being able to keep our players fresh has been really important for us,” says Shakir. “It’s been particularly important during playoff runs and recently helped us to win the school’s first playoff game since 2014.”

As Shakir and his team continue to use PLAYERTEK to build a deeper understanding of performance in high school football, Manatee is aiming to increase the efficiency of their sessions to ensure that players are optimally prepared to meet their physical and positional demands throughout the season.