INTRODUCTION: The tethered test is one of the most widely used methods for estimating the swimming force. (Dopsaj, 2003). However, tethered test results were debatable for the low correlation with the swimming performance and for the test`s duration. In this work we investigate which is the duration of the tethered test that allows to obtain results highly correlated with the swimming performances. METHODS: We defined four types of tethered test that differ only for them duration (15s for T15, 30s for T30, 45s for T45, 60s for T60). Six female national ranked swimmers (age 16±0; 1.64±0,02 m; 58.0±5kg.) performed 4 tethered tests with maximum intensity for T15, T30, T45, T60. The force was recorded with a load-cell (Globus, Italia). Blood lactate measurements were performed 1 m after the end of each trial (L15 for T15, L30 for T30, L45 for T45, L60 for T60). We investigated the correlation between the value of strength (N) recorded by the load-cell and the best-time performance of the athletes for each type of tethered test. These performances result from the official competitions in distances of 50m (V50), 100m (V100) and 200m (V200) crawl. RESULTS: The significant correlations between the best-time of swimmers and the load cell measurements were: V50/T15= 0.95 (<0.05), V50/T30= 0.95 (<0.05), V100/T15= 0.87 (<0.025), V100/T30= 0.96 (<0.05), V100/ T45= 0.79 (<0.05). The average blood lactate produced increased linearly with increasing duration of the test (5.15 mml/l for L15, 7.13 mml/l for L30, 8.72 mml/l for L45, 9.65 mml/l for L60). DISCUSSION: This study shows a good correlation between the best-time performance on the distances of 50 m and 100 m and the values of force measured using the tethered test with duration 15 s and 30 s. Data are less related in the test of longer duration and distance of 200 m. These findings, in part yet submitted by other authors, seem to confirm the link between the tests with short time duration and the performances with greater use of power and predominance of anaerobic energy. T15 and T30 tethered test are probably the best to highlight capacities of the young sprinters in swimming. REFERENCES: Dopsaj M., Matkovic I., Thanopoulos V., Okicic T., (2003) Realibility and validity of basic kinematics and mechanical characteristics of pulling force in swimmers measured by the method of tethered swimming with maximum intensity of 60 seconds. Facta Universitatis, 1(10), 11-22.
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