COMPARISON OF ACTUAL AND PREDICTED ANTHROPOMETRIC CHARACTERISTICS OF CZECH ELITE GYMNASTS

Abstract

In context of artistic gymnastics, the influence of intense training on the growth anddevelopment of male and female gymnasts is often discussed. The aim of this work is tocompare the attained and predicted body height and length of body segments in 11 elite malegymnasts from the Czech Republic who have undergone intense trainings for 12 years ormore. The average age of the research sample was 33 ± 11.5 years, body height 174.9 ± 4.1cm and weight 71.5 ± 5.13 kg. Using standardized anthropometric measurements, weobtained the body height (BH) and length of the trunk, upper and lower limbs, arms,forearms, thighs, and calves. Using the t-test (p .05) ˂, a comparison of the actual andpredicted body height was made using three different predictive equations. The results werealso compared with relative lengths of body segments as reported by Chaffin & Anderssonand Brugsch. In most cases, the results indicated lower actual body height than predictedbody height, this difference was statistically significant in two of the three predictiveequations. The relative predicted length of the upper limbs (0.442BH), arms (0.189BH), lowerlimbs (0.515BH), thighs (0.257BH) and calves (0.251BH) corresponds with the predictedlength of these segments. Actual trunk length (0.544BH) and forearm length (0.166BH) islonger than the predicted length. Based on the analysis of the body segments of the gymnastswe can say that the gymnasts have a longer trunk, medium long upper limbs and shorterlower limbs.