10×5m Shuttle Run

Girls' median times plateau almost completely after age 13 (~22 s), with essentially no improvement through age 17. Boys continue improving through age 17, reaching 19.5 s at the median. The same girls-plateau pattern appears in the standing broad jump and PACER, suggesting it is a broad feature of adolescent fitness data rather than specific to this test.

The 10x5m shuttle run (Eurofit) and the 4x10m shuttle run (ALPHA Fitness) are two different protocols. The Eurofit test uses 10 one-way legs of 5 m (50 m total, 9 direction changes). The ALPHA test uses 4 one-way legs of 10 m (40 m total, 3 direction changes). The shorter distance and more direction changes in the Eurofit version place greater emphasis on repeated deceleration and agility; the ALPHA version gives more room for acceleration over each leg. Norms from this page apply only to the Eurofit 10x5m protocol.

Yes. Tomkinson et al. (2018) report P10, P20, P30, P70, P80, and P90 directly. P25 is approximated as (P20+P30)/2 and P75 as (P70+P80)/2, consistent with the convention for all Eurofit metrics on this site.

The test primarily measures speed and change-of-direction ability over a short distance. It is distinct from aerobic endurance, measured by PACER, and from explosive power, measured by standing broad jump. Because the course requires 20 direction changes over 50 metres, braking and re-acceleration matter more than top speed.

The Tomkinson 2018 dataset pools data from 19 European countries (n=258,618), so these are European youth reference values. They are useful for broad benchmarking in school or sport settings, but country-level norms can differ and they should not be treated as a universal standard.