Drag and sprint performance of wheelchair basketball players

The purpose of this study was to measure the wheelchair drag and maximal sprint performance abilities of wheelchair basketball players and to make comparisons between male and female players. A group of nine male and eight female wheelchair basketball players attending a national training camp consented to serve as subjects. Each subject completed six coast-down trials at speeds from a walking pace (1 to 1.5 m/s) to maximal for determining wheelchair drag and then performed four maximal sprint trials from a stationary start over the length (35 m) of the gymnasium floor. A portable computer that recorded the time to the nearest 0.001 second of each half revolution of a rear wheel was attached to the wheelchair of each subject. The drag force during the coast-down trials and the power output during the sprint trials were determined from the recorded data. Differences between the genders in a number of subject and trial variables were evaluated by t-tests using the 0.05 level of significance. There were no significant differences between the means of the male and female groups in age (27 vs. 28 yrs), wheelchair mass (12.0 vs. 11.61 kg), or regression predicted drag forces at speeds of 2 m/s (5.3 vs. 5.5 N) and 5 m/s (16.7 vs. 13.5 N). The male subjects were significantly heavier (78.3 vs. 59.1 kg) and had a higher tire pressure (123 vs. 94 psi). In the sprint trial results, the males exhibited a significantly higher maximal speed (4.75 vs. 4.08 m/s), higher peak acceleration (1.32 vs. 1.03 m/s/s), and a higher peak power output (530 vs. 264 w).