The Assessment of physical fitness in wheelchair basketball players

We did this study to determine the physical fitness levels of wheelchair basketballplayers also to determine the differences of physical fitness levels of higher andlower body controlled players who designated according to points from internationalwheelchair federation classification system. We also aimed to constitute anassessment form for physiotherapists, trainers and other health care assistants. 60sportsmen were joined into the study. Sportsmen were divided two groups accordingto the league they are playing in and the points they get from internationalwheelchair basketball classification system. We used a questionnaire to investigatecharacteristic features related with doing sport. We evaluated their bodycomposition, upper extremity isometric muscle strengths, hand grip strengths, audioand visual simple reaction times, speed and cardiovascular endurance levels. Wecouldn?t find a statistical significance in their sport years, years with disability, fatpercentage, fat weights, upper extremity isometric muscle strengths, right hand gripstrengths, audio and visual reaction time (p>0.05). We found statistical differences infavors of I. league players in training hours, percentage of being injured, body weightwithout fat, left hand grip strengths, cardiovascular endurance and speed (p<0.05).We couldn?t find statistically significance in sports years, year with disability,training hours, percentage of being injured, fat percentages, fat weights, bodyweights without fat, grip strengths, muscle strengths of right elbow extension, rightand left wrist extension and wrist flexion, audio and visual simple reactions timesand speed of sportsmen with higher and lower points (p>0.05). We determined thatmuscle strengths of right and left shoulder flexion, abduction, elbow flexion, leftelbow extension and cardiovascular endurance levels were better in sportsmen withhigher points (p<0.05). There were significant relations between training hours andspeed, weights without fat, being a player in national team, being injured previously(p<0.05). We also found significant relations between left hand grip strength and7speed (p<0.05). As a conclusion we can say that the special training program shouldbe planned for per player with the direction of our data.Keywords: Wheelchair basketball sports, physical fitness8