Validity of fat-free weight equations for estimating mean and peak power in high school wrestlers

The purpose of this study was to cross-validate the fat-free weight (FFW) equations derived on nonathletic children and adolescents for estimating mean power (MP) and peak power (PP) in high school wrestlers. One hundred and three male high school wrestlers performed the Wingate Anaerobic Test to estimate MP and PP, as well as underwater weighing to determine FFW. The follow equations were used to estimate the MP and PP of the wrestlers in the current study. MP (W) = 9.3 (FFW) -109.8 EQ.1 PP (W) = 14.1 (FFW) -162.1 EQ.2 The results in the current study indicated that as percent of the mean values, the equation that predicted MP resulted in a substantially greater total error (TE; 19.9% of the mean) than the equation that predicted PP (8.3% of the mean). These findings indicated that the equation that was derived on nonathletes did not accurately estimate MP in the high school wrestlers. The equation for estimating PP, however, was valid when applied to the current sample of high school wrestlers. These findings supported previous studies that have shown that in adolescent males, exercise training improves the metabolic capabilities of the anaerobic glycolytic system, but not the phosphagen system.