Associations of body morphology and body composition with swimming performance in male and female youth swimmers: an exploratory cross-sectional study
Zhanyang He, Sujing Su, Xujun Liu, Xun Jin, Cuimei Shen, Houwei Zhu et al. · Frontiers in Physiology · 2026
Objective: To investigate the associations of body morphology and body composition with swimming performance in male and female provincial youth swimmers.
Methods: This cross-sectional study included 49 swimmers: 25 males (FINA points: 582 ± 66; age: 12.5 ± 0.7 years; height: 162.3 ± 6.6 cm; weight: 47.4 ± 6.9 kg) and 24 females (FINA points: 620 ± 84; age: 11.8 ± 0.8 years; height: 156.4 ± 6.1 cm; weight: 43.5 ± 5.1 kg). Competitive performance was represented by each swimmer's highest FINA point score. BMI, body proportions, body fat percentage, and hand and foot areas were assessed. Sex-stratified correlation and exploratory regression analyses were performed with false discovery rate correction and formal interaction testing.
Results: Among female swimmers, FINA points were positively correlated with age, BMI, hand area, and foot area after FDR correction, whereas no corrected associations were observed among males. In the primary adjusted female model, hand area remained positively associated with FINA points; however, this estimate was attenuated after influential observations were excluded (β = 0.370, p = 0.052). Neither the sex × BMI nor the sex × hand area interaction was significant.
Conclusion: In this exploratory sample, hand area showed a positive adjusted association with FINA points among female swimmers, but the estimate was sensitive to influential observations. These
Findings: are hypothesis-generating and require confirmation in larger independent samples.