Investigation of the posture structures of elite racket athletes

In this study, it is aimed to determine the body asymmetries that occur due to training and competitions that require the use of the dominant side of the body in racquet sports, by comparing them with each other and with sedentary ones.. The sample of the study was determined on the basis of the principle of voluntarism, actively doing sports for at least 5 years, taking part in national teams, having a degree in national and international competitions; Among the racquet players in Kastamonu, Samsun, Çorum, Ankara and Afyonkarahisar, a total of 61 male athletes with an average age of 17.85±4.0 years, 23 from badminton, 19 tennis and 19 table tennis branches, and 36 male sedentary athletes with an average age of 18.28±2.9 years. PostureScreen Mobile application with proven validity and reliability was used in postural analysis. IBM SPSS 23.0 package program was used in the statistical analysis and evaluation of the data. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test was used to look at the normality levels of the data, and the One Way ANOVA was used to determine whether there was a statistically significant difference between the means of the groups. The post-hoc Gabriel test, which allows for clearly unequal sample sizes, was applied to identify the source of the difference between groups. As a result, it was determined that elite level racquet sports athletes differ from sedentary in many posture parameters, especially in the shoulder and head region, on the other hand, some posture parameters also show significant differences between branches. In branches that require the use of asymmetric extremities, such as racquet sports, it is recommended to perform posture corrective exercises to eliminate this asymmetry.