Anthropometry in Premenarcheal Female Esthetic Sports Athletes and Ballerinas

Abstract

Body size and build influences performance in many sports, especially in those pertaining to the group of female esthetic sports like artistic gymnastics, rhythmic gymnastics and figure skating. These sports pose high specific demands upon the functional, energy, motor and psychological capacities of athletes; but also upon the size, body build and composition of the performers, particularly of elite level females. Similar can be seen in ballet, an artistic theatrical expression of dancing. Contrary to the majority of other sports, morphological predispositions for esthetic sports, rhythmic gymnastics in particular, and ballet are similar: a smaller size and body mass of female performers. Ballet and the group of esthetic sports are specific also because regular serious workouts begin early at the pre-school age and very soon the nature of training programs can be described as of high intensity, high frequency and long duration with the eventual demands of maintaining minimal amounts of subcutaneous body fat. The maintenance of the indispensable anthropometric characteristics and body composition over the years of training and competition frequently determine the kind of diet with a reduced energy intake. Expectedly, ballerinas and female athletes in esthetic sports mostly belong to the group of late-maturing girls. Namely, body linearity, or slimness, is connected with later maturation. However, there is still an ongoing debate whether a long-lasting, high-volume and intense, early commenced training in gymnastics, along with modified nutrition, which does not follow the energy demands of the training process, may in some girls jeopardize growth and provoke later sexual maturation. In adolescence, female esthetic sports athletes have lower values of body mass index and a body fat percentage with adequate fat-free mass in comparison to non-athletes and female athletes in other sports. Such a body build and composition, typical for the premenarcheal aged girls, particularly artistic gymnasts contributes to the increased strength/weight ratio, stability and a decrease in the moments of inertia (Borms, J and Caine, DJ, In: Sands WA, Caine DJ, Borms J, editors. Scientific aspects of women’ gymnastics. Medicine and sport science 45. Borms J, Hebbelinck M, Hills AP, editors. Karger, Basel. p. 110–127, 2003), thus improving the execution of the demanding elements, but also the esthetic impression of performance. Fat percentage and endomorphy ratings are connected to the performance of esthetic female athletes as well as with the incidence and duration of recovery after injury in ballet dancers. A careful follow-up of the anthropometric characteristics in this group of female athletes and ballerinas, besides any information relevant to the monitoring of training program effects, will give an insight into the dynamics of growth and nutritional state of young athletes.