Morphometric evaluation of lumbar vertebrae in elite level wrestling and weightlifting athletes

This research was carried out to reveal the structural differences by examining the lumbar vertebrae of elite male wrestling and weightlifting athletes and male sedentary individuals morphometrically. A total of 36 men, 12 wrestling athletes, 12 weightlifting athletes and 12 sedentary individuals, participated in the study. Magnetic resonance imaging device was used for two-dimensional and three-dimensional measurements of lumbar vertebrae, and stereological methods were used for the analysis of the obtained magnetic resonance images. One-Way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), one of the parametric tests, and the Kruskal Wallis test statistics, one of the nonparametric tests, were used in the analysis of the data. For the statistical significance level, p<0.05 was accepted. As a result of the measurements, a statistically significant difference was observed between sedentary individuals and weightlifting athletes in terms of vertebral corpus anterior height, vertebral corpus posterior height, biloncav deformity rate and compression deformity rate; a significant difference was found between wrestling and weightlifting athletes in terms of intervertebral disc anterior height, intervertebral disc medium height, biconvexity index ratio, vertebral corpus volume and intervertebral disc volume. There was no significant difference between the groups in terms of vertebral corpus medium height, vertebral corpus diameter, anterior wedge deformity ratio, intervertebral disc posterior height and farfan ratio. In the light of the results of our study, in order to reduce the structural degenerations in the spine of weightlifters, the load on their spine should be minimized. Therefore, it is very important to perform sports activities by considering the skeletal system biomechanics of athletes. In this context, federations should direct their sports clubs, especially for weightlifting trainers to receive training on skeletal system biomechanics. Determining the biomechanical characteristics of the athletes and preparing the appropriate training program for the athlete in this direction will ensure that the techniques and movements are performed more accurately and consciously during both training and competition.