INTRODUCTION: Paralympic badminton has been adopted at the 2020 summer Paralympics in Tokyo. Paralympic badminton can be categorized into wheelchair athletes and standing athletes. So far there has never been researched on physical fitness tests and training interventions for Paralympic badminton athletes. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of physical fitness tests and training interventions conducted on Paralympic badminton players. METHODS: The participants were 14 Paralympic badminton players who can be divided into wheelchair athletes and standing athletes. This study measured for these athletes including body composition measurements, muscle strength tests, and aerobic capacity tests. Bodyweight, lean body mass (LBM), and body fat percentage were measured by the method of air displacement. Isokinetic strength of the extensor and flexor muscles at the knee joints were evaluated by dynamometry for standing athletes. On the other hand, upper muscle strength which includes push power and pull power were evaluated for wheelchair athletes. To measure the aerobic capacity, they performed on each multistage running test and bike ergometer test for standing athletes or hand ergometer test for wheelchair athletes, including 3-minutes stages separated by a 1-minute rest with speed or watt were increased every stage. All the tests were conducted 4 times from September 2020 to July 2021. The data that the initial day (pre) and the last day (post) were analyzed. 12 athletes of among them took part in training inventions. RESULTS: The results showed that standing athletes` body composition measurements, muscle strength, and aerobic capacity for standing athletes were not significant compared pre and post. By contrast, body weight and body fat percentage were lower than in pre for wheelchair athletes. And upper muscle strength which includes push power and pull power were larger than in pre. On the other hand, aerobic capacity for wheelchair athletes were not significant compared pre and post. CONCLUSION: This study has shown that wheelchair athletes improved data in body composition measurements and muscle strength tests, however, there was no significant difference pre and post for standing athletes. We can see the effects of the training interventions for particularly wheelchair athletes so that we discuss them in detail. Wheelchair athletes are required for not only badminton skills but also wheelchair skills and the power which are to move forward or backward. We conducted resistance training including push power and pull power focused on the upper body of wheelchair athletes. For this reason, Para badminton wheelchair athletes could improve upper body power. The main point of this study is that physical fitness tests and training interventions are effective for wheelchair athletes particularly.
© Copyright 2022 27th Annual Congress of the European College of Sport Science (ECSS), Sevilla, 30. Aug - 2. Sep 2022. Veröffentlicht von Faculty of Sport Science - Universidad Pablo de Olavide. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.