Effectiveness of Fitness Testing for Assessment of Male Basketball Athletes- A Cross-sectional Study

Introduction: Basketball players should have physical characteristics which include sports-specific skills and demands. Activities including sprinting, and jumping require abilities with speed, power, strength, and agility. These have to be evaluated using fitness tests which help in having a good impact on the game. Assessment of their performance will be helpful for designing and monitoring the efficacy of basketball athletes’ training regimes.

Aim: To assess the body composition and fitness tests specific to cardiorespiratory fitness, upper and lower limb strength, endurance, flexibility and agility in 20-29 years male basketball players.

Materials and Methods: It was an observational cross-sectional study which was conducted on 30 male basketball players in Dr. DY Patil Medical College, Pune, Maharashtra, India from June 2017 to December 2017. Participants were assessed for specific fitness tests conducted in two days. Agility, upper extremity strength, lower extremity endurance including flexibility, was tested on the first day, followed by body composition, cardiorespiratory fitness, upper extremity endurance and lower extremity strength on another day.

Results: The mean age of the male basketball players was 21.8 years. The mean Body Mass Index (BMI) was 22.53 Kg/m2. It showed a poor (35.58±4.80) cardiorespiratory fitness using the Beep Test. For the upper limb, there was poor flexibility (13.01±3.45). However, the lower limb endurance (60.33±19.80) and agility (12.08±0.66) showed excellent results.

Conclusion: The study concluded that lower extremity fitness was better than upper extremity in male basketball players.