Predictors of physical performance in national level male Kho Kho players: a cross-sectional analysis

Purpose To investigate the predictive ability of nutritional status, sleep quality and lean body mass for physical performance in National level Kho Kho players. Methods Fifty national level Kho Kho players (age: 23.1 +/- 3.74 years, BMI: 21.4 +/- 1.87 kg/m(2)) participated in this study. Nutritional status (saccharide, protein and fat intake, serum calcium and serum vitamin D3 and fluid intake), sleep quality and lean body mass of all the participants was evaluated. Dependent variables which demarcated physical performance such as speed, power and agility were also evaluated with the help of validated field tests. Appropriate statistical tests were employed to test the predictive ability of independent variables for physical performance parameters. Results Univariate analysis showed that fluid and protein intake were significant predictors of speed performance. Sleep quality was found to be a significant predictor of agility performance while lean body mass came out to be a predictor of power performance. However, when these variables were fitted into multivariate models controlling for various covariates, only fluid intake of the athletes came out to be a significant independent predictor of speed performance [0.99 (0.99, 1.00); p = 0.003] in Kho Kho players. Conclusions Findings of the present study suggest that sleep quality of athletes was associated with agility performance while lean body mass was associated with power performance and protein intake was found to be associated with speed performance. Most importantly, our results suggested that fluid intake is a significant independent predictor of speed performance in national level Kho Kho players.