Analysis of body mass components in national club football players in Republic of Macedonia.

AIM: This study aims to analyze body composition in adult male football players and its changes during adulthood.

METHODS: Adult male football players (n = 942, mean age 24.11 +/- 4.69 y), all members of national competitive clubs from Macedonia were included in the study. The absolute and the relative body components were calculated: lean body mass (LBMkg), muscle mass (MMkg; MM%), bone mass (BMkg; BM%) and fat components (FMkg; FM%), using the anthropometric protocol by Matiegka.

RESULTS: Mean values of anthropometric measures for all included participants were as follows: height = 178.39 +/- 6.11 cm; weight = 77.02 +/- 7.57; LBM = 65.65 +/- 6.38; MM% = 53.23 +/- 2.78; BM% = 17.05 +/- 1.27; FM% = 14.58 +/- 1.48. Descriptive statistics for these parameters was made for age specific groups.

CONCLUSIONS: The results obtained could be used as reference values for adult football players in Republic of Macedonia. In the examined age span (18-35 years) a slight increase of absolute values of all three body components has been registered with advancing age. The most significant increase in the absolute values was registered for the muscle component, followed by the fat and bone components, respectively. Regarding the relative values (%), the muscle and the fat components showed an equally slight positive correlation with the age increase of 1 year, whilst the bone component decreased with advancing age.