Validity of Anthropometric Estimations of Body Composition in High School Wrestlers

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Abstract
The purpose of this study was to determine the validity of 23 anthropometric equations for estimating body composition and minimal wrestling weight in high school wrestlers. A total of 409 high school wrestlers (M age ± SD = 16.42 ± 1.03 yrs) volunteered for this study. Twenty-three anthropometric measures including eight skinfolds, nine circumferences, and six diameters were obtained from each subject. The mean body density, determined from underwater weighing, was 1.0748 ± 0.0100 gcm−3. The crossvalidation analyses indicated that the quadratic skinfold equation of Lohman resulted in the most accurate estimation of body density. The total error, constant error, standard error of estimate, and r for this equation were 0.0077 gcm−3, −0.0003 gcm−3, 0.0076 gcm−3 and .65, respectively. Furthermore, the results of this investigation indicated that the minimal wrestling weight equations of Tcheng and Tipton resulted in total error values (5.54 to 6.06 kg) which were too large to be of practical use for high school wrestlers.