Whether you’re a major-league superstar or a weekend warrior on the local team, you probably have some questions about sports vision and what kind of options are available. As an athlete, you rely heavily on your vision, as it is a vital part of things like depth perception, peripheral visual awareness, reaction time, focusing speed, accuracy, dynamic visual acuity, and hand-eye coordination. If you are concerned about one or more of these things, schedule an appointment to have a sports vision test. This test is specially designed to check the areas of your vision that are related to sports performance.

What is the Snellen Eye Chart?

The Snellen Eye chart is as iconic as the McDonald’s logo, with the top row of letters being the biggest and then each line decreasing in size downward. The smaller the line you can read, the better your vision. The most common way to remedy someone’s vision based on this chart is with glasses, and it’s important to keep in mind that untreated vision problems in younger athletes can be affecting their sports performance negatively. 

What is a Contrast Sensitivity Test?

A contrast sensitivity test determined how well you can distinguish between different shades of a single color by showing you parallel gray lines. Sometimes problems with contrast sensitivity can be treated with tinted glasses, although not all doctors agree with whether this actually improves athletic performance.

What is an Eye Tracking Test?

Eye tracking tests involve seeing how well your eye can follow an object, which is frequently some kind of ball if you’re playing a sport. You can actually improve your eye tracking with training programs that require you to exercise your eyes by following an object in a circular motion.

What is an Eye Dominance Test?

One of your eyes is dominant, meaning it determines the orientation of the “frame” through which you see everything. You can perform this test yourself by looking through each eye with the other one closed. Whichever eye your looking through when the “frame” didn’t shift is your dominant eye. Optometrists have their own version of this test.