Anthropometric evaluation of body composition in ballet dancers. A longitudinal study

Resumen

The body of the adolescent dancer is the result of morphological, physiological and behavioral adaptations due to specific physical training. For the ballet master, body weight is irrelevant to evaluating the technical and artistic performance and beauty of a figure. All ballet dancers must have bodies that conform to the canon of international ballet in order to be able to perform in public. The purpose of this study is to describe the changes in the body composition of dancers at the Cuban National School of Ballet between two points in their training process. This was a longitudinal study of 54 girls and 40 boys, aged between 15 and 20 years old. An anthropometric protocol of 6 measurements was employed in order to determine body composition using the Durnin and Rahaman method for females and the Parizková and Buzková method for males. The main results demonstrate signifi cant increases in both weight and height for age in both sexes, and it was observed that height growth velocity decreased with age. The female dancers exhibited stable body fat percentages for all ages while male dancers signifi cantly reduced this percentage from one year to the next. The female students exhibited higher mean percentage body fat values than the normal range established in Cuba for elite athletes from competitive artistic sports and professional dancers, while the male students exhibited body fat percentages that were similar to these specialized groups.