Effect of age on hand grip strength in professional cricket players

Pages: 774-776
Pavan K.Talupuru (Chief Clinical Therapist, UP Cricket Team, UPCA, Kanpur, UP)
Sivachidambaram Kulandaivelan (Department of Physiotherapy, GJUS&T, Hisar, Haryana)
Naif Ziad Alrashdi and Mahamed Ateef (Department of Physicaltherapy, Majmaah University, Majmaah, KSA)

Cricket is most popular team sport in India. Hand-grip strength (HGS) plays a vital part in all roles of cricket which may be affected by age. To find-out the effect of age on HGS in Indian professional cricket players. Study-design: Experimental study; different subject design. Sampling technique: Convenient sampling Sample size: 322 male cricket players aged between 13 and 38 years. Independent variable: Age group (13-16, 17-19, 20-25, and 26-38) Dependent variable: HGS in 3 different positions for both right and left side. Instrument used: Jamar hand-held electronic hand-grip dynamometer. Statistics: Mean standard deviation (SD) as descriptive and one-way ANNOVA with LSD post-hoc analysis as inferential statistics. 13-16 group showed significantly lower HGS than other three age groups. HGS increased up to 25 years without any significance. Peak HGS value was shared between 20-25 and 26-38 groups. Hand-grip strength (HGS) is significantly lower in young players (13-16 years) than adults possibly due to differences in attaining puberty by this age category which affects HGS through testosterone in blood. The possible lack of difference after 18 years may be sports training help those three groups to achieve peak testosterone level in blood which helps muscle building hence HGS.