Investigation and comparison of anthropometric, somatotype and physical fitness characteristics of the twelfth students’ Olympiad medal winners with national champions

The purpose of this study was to investigate the anthropometric, somatotype and physical fitness characteristics of medal winners in the twelfth students’ athletic games and compare their characteristics with national champions in the same sport to determine the difference between athletes at two different levels of national and universities.

medal winners (male and female) of different sports in this student’s games were invited to participate in the study. After attending to the laboratories, all subjects’ body composition, somatotype and anthropometric characteristics were measured. Thereafter, their body abilities including flexibility, anaerobic lactic acid capacity, anaerobic alactic acid capacity and aerobic power were determined. One sample t-test was used as statistical analysis of data at P ≤ 0.05.

the best performances in male were for freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestlers. In addition, in female, badminton players had the best flexibility and anaerobic lactic capacity, volleyball players had the best anaerobic alactic capacity, and runners had the best aerobic power. Comparison of national champions’ norms with winners of student’s games revealed higher physical abilities (P < 0.05) and a better somatotype (P < 0.05) for national champions.

with respect to physical abilities, somatotype and body composition student’s athletes are in a far lower level than national champions and that they cannot be used as a support for national sports. Therefore, the Iranian national student athletic federation and physical education department for Ministry of sciences must design a careful program to increase the level of physical fitness and physiological characteristics of students’ athletes in different sports and to lessen their differences with national champions.