Anaerobic ability in juvenile male Free- and Greco-Roman style wrestlers

Abstract

Background. Wrestling has very long tradition as a combat sport. The wresting competitions were played during the ancient Olympic Games. In the modern Olympic Games wresting is represented by two styles, free (FS) and Greco-Roman (GRS) style. There are differ regarding task structures, but in both cases physiological and physical demands are very high. We sought to check, whether wrestlers` anaerobic leg power and capacity are related to the wrestling style.Material and methods. Juvenile male FS (n=20) and GRS (n=22) of the similar anthropometric and demographic characteristics were subjected to perform Wingate test(30s). Absolute values of relative peak power (PP) , total work output (WO), time to PP (T att) and time sustained of at least 97.5 % of PP (Tsus). Resting blood cortisol and testosterone levels were determined on the day of testing.Results. Both groups demonstrated almost the same values of PP, WO and hormonal status. The only slight differences regarded kinematic data. GRS wrestlers demonstrated shorter (by 16.4%) T att and longer (by 13,3%) T sus. Weak correlations were found between hormones and biomechanical variables.Conclusion. Type of wresting style does not affect anaerobic leg performance if the both groups of athletes do not differ in demographic and anthropometric characteristics.

Performance Differences Between Greco-Roman and Freestyle Wrestlers: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

“…One of the challenges confronting both GR and Fr wrestlers is to maintain a high intensity of repeated actions for an extended period during a wrestling match. During quick and explosive exertions, the required energy is provided by the phosphagen (ATP-PC) and glycolytic energy pathways (31,37,38). As wrestling is not a fixed-paced sport, it is necessary to generate high power during all-out actions and replenish the highenergy phosphate stores during low-intensity actions (9,29).…”