Influence of body anthropometry on race performance in extreme endurance triathletes - World Challenge Deca Iron Triathlon 2006

Beat Knechtle ^1*, Patrizia Knechtle ¹, Jorge Luis Andonie ² and Götz Kohler ³

¹ Gesundheitszentrum St. Gallen, Switzerland
² Multisport Andonie, Mexico
³ Division of Biophysical Chemistry, Biozentrum, University of Basel, Switzerland

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: beat.knechtle{at}hispeed.ch.

Accepted 6 March 2007

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the influence of anthropometric parameters on race performance in extreme endurance triathletes in an ultratriathlon.

DESIGN: Descriptive field study.

SETTING: The "World Challenge Deca Iron Triathlon 2006" in Monterrey, Mexico, where athletes had to perform every day the distance of an Ironman triathlon of 3.8 km swimming, 180 km cycling and 42.195 km running within 10 consecutive days.

SUBJECTS: Eight male extreme endurance athletes (40.6 ± 10.7 years, 76.4 ± 8.4 kg, 175 ± 4 cm, BMI 24.7 ± 2.2 kg/m2).

INTERVENTIONS: None.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Determination of body mass, height, length of lower limbs, skin fold thicknesses, perimeter of extremities as well as calculation of BMI, skeletal muscle mass (SM), percent SM (%SM) and percent body fat (%BF) in order to correlate measured and calculated anthropometric parameters with race performance.

RESULTS: Race time is not significantly influenced by the directly measured anthropometric properties height, length of limbs, body mass, average skinfold thickness, and the limb perimeters of thigh, calf and upper arm (p>0.05). Furthermore, no significant influence was observed between race time and the calculated parameters BMI, %SM and %BF (p>0.05).

CONCLUSIONS: In a multi-stage ultratriathlon over ten times an Ironman triathlon within 10 consecutive days, we find no influence from body mass, height, length of limbs, skin fold thicknesses, perimeters of extremities, BMI, %SM and %BF on race performance in the only 8 successful finishers.

Key Words: BMI, body mass index, extreme endurance, fat mass, skeletal muscle mass

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