Using absolute and relative muscle endurance to estimate maximal strength in young athletes

• Published in: International journal of sports physiology and performance Vol. 2; no. 3; p. 305
• Main Authors: Mayhew, Jerry L, Hill, Sidney Palmer, Thompson, Melissa D, Johnson, Eric C, Wheeler, Lyndsay
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 01-09-2007
• Subjects: Adolescent; Analysis of Variance; Anthropometry; Exercise Tolerance - physiology; Humans; Male; Muscle Strength - physiology; Muscle, Skeletal - physiology; Resistance Training; Schools; Weight Lifting - physiology
• ISSN: 1555-0265
• DOI: 10.1123/ijspp.2.3.305

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of repetitions to fatigue (RTF) using absolute and relative muscle-endurance performances to estimate 1-repetition-maximum (1-RM) bench-press performance in high school male athletes.
Members of high school athletic teams (n = 118, age = 16.5 +/- 1.1 y, weight = 82.7 +/- 18.7 kg) were tested for 1-RM bench press and RTF with an absolute load of 61.4 kg and a relative load that produced 7 to 10 RTF (7- to 10-RM). All participants had completed a minimum of 4 wk of resistance training before measurement.
All 7- to 10-RM-prediction equations had higher correlations between predicted and actual 1-RM (r > .98) than the 61.4-kg absolute-load equation (r = .95). Despite the high correlations, only 3 of 11 equations produced predicted values that were nonsignificantly different from actual 1-RM. The best 7-to 10-RM equation predicted 65% of the athletes'performances within +/-4.5 kg of their actual 1-RM. The addition of simple anthropometric dimensions did not increase the validity correlations or decrease the prediction errors.
The 7- to 10-RM method can provide an accurate method of estimating strength levels for adjusting loads in a training program and is more accurate for predicting 1-RM bench press in high school athletes than the 61.4-kg repetition method.