Investigation of the effect of the COVİD-19 pandemic process on the elite kickboxing athletes' epidemic anxiety, dietary behaviors and physical activity levels

In this study; It was aimed to examine the impact of the Covid 19 pandemic process on elite kickboxing athletes' epidemic disease concerns, diet behaviors and physical activity levels. The universe of the research; The Turkish Kickboxing Federation consists of 4370 athletes who have the right to participate in the National team selection in the youth and senior categories in 2021. The sample consists of a total of 170 national elite kickboxing athletes, 68 in the youth category and 102 in the senior category, participating in the European and World kickboxing championships. In the research, participants; Personal Information Form, Epidemic Disease Anxiety Scale, Dietary Behavior Form and International Physical Activity Survey Short Form were applied. A statistical package program was used to analyze the data, and p<0.05 was considered statistically significant. In light of the findings obtained; During the Covid-19 restrictions of elite kickboxing athletes, there was an increase in the time men spent indoors compared to women, athletes with high school education spent more time in front of the screen, and there was no change in the weights of those with a low body mass index; More than half of the athletes do not have or are less worried about epidemic diseases, epidemic disease anxiety does not change the sleep time of athletes, the amount of food and vegetable consumption at breakfast increases in men compared to women, singles consume more foods such as chips and cookies, athletes with high school education do not have more anxiety at breakfast. While it was found significant that the amount of food consumed at dinner increased, the amount of food consumed by athletes with low body mass index at breakfast increased, and more than half of the athletes had a high level of physical activity, no significance was found in other variables. In conclusion; It can be said that elite kickboxing athletes had low epidemic disease concerns and high physical activity levels during the pandemic period, the time spent indoors and in front of the screen during the restrictions affected their diet behaviors, the tendency towards the main meal increased in young and older ages, and the pandemic process did not affect the physical activity level of national level athletes. Keywords: Covid, Pandemic Anxiety, Diet, Physical Activity, Kickboxing