Correlations between Anthropometric Measurements and Sports Discipline Aptitude

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

I read this manuscript with large pleasure. I think, the content and significance for the sport practice is very high. A sufficient scouting for different kind of sports at an early time point is an important scientific question in sports science and sports medicine.

Some remarks for the rework:

1. Table 1: Please round sensible (e.g., 179.95 = 180 or 101.8 = 102). Please use three reliable numbers.

2. Please change the writing direction in the left column of table 2 by 180°. It should be readable from the right side (e.g., badminton)

3. Table 3: Please add the used statistical measue. At the moment, it is unclear what you calculated (e.g., ICC?)  

4. Please add a limitation section at the end of the discussion.

Author Response

Rebuttal Reviewer 1

1. Table 1: Please round sensible (e.g., 179.95 = 180 or 101.8 = 102). Please use three reliable numbers. – the required adjustment was performed.
2. Please change the writing direction in the left column of table 2 by 180°. It should be readable from the right side (e.g., badminton) – the left column was rotated by 180°
3. Table 3: Please add the used statistical measure. At the moment, it is unclear what you calculated (e.g., ICC?) – here we do not really know how to incorporate intraclass correlation to the presented model. Some more guidance is required from the reviewer. As it is now the DT model simply differentiates between the sports.
4. Please add a limitation section at the end of the discussion. – the limitation section was added at the end of the discussion.

Reviewer 2 Report

Thank you for allowing me to read this interesting manuscript. Overall, I found this to be clearly presented and as such only have some minor comments for the authors to consider. However, one point that really does need clarifying is the rationale for the sports and measures included, as well as the practical implications of the findings.

The abstract would benefit from the inclusion of a sentence providing a brief rationale for the study. Similarly, it is unclear what the rationale for the sports and measures are. The results section needs to be supported with some data e.g. r² values etc. The conclusion is clear, but the practical implications could be more explicit.

The introduction does help to provide a rationale for the study, but, like the abstract, it needs to be developed in order to provide a clear rationale for the sports and measures assessed. Is there also any merit in including a brief section relating to the potential benefits for sport and selection of using a machine learning algorithm?

It is unclear that is being in Table 3; the heading needs to be more specific.

The discussion provides some interesting information, but it would be helpful if the authors could develop the practical implications and potential limitations of the study.

I hope that the authors find the above comments to be helpful and in the constructive manner that they are intended.

Author Response

Rebuttal Reviewer 2

The abstract would benefit from the inclusion of a sentence providing a brief rationale for the study. Similarly, it is unclear what the rationale for the sports and measures are. – the following introductory sentence was introduced into the abstract section. “Sport specialization is required for advancement of elite-level skill of a competitor. Therefore, this study is an attempt to assess applicability of anthropometric measurements for a tailored selection of sport discipline.”

The results section needs to be supported with some data e.g. r² values etc. – the presented model is a pure density tree model without any statistical differentiation between the obtained data.

The introduction does help to provide a rationale for the study, but, like the abstract, it needs to be developed in order to provide a clear rationale for the sports and measures assessed. – to fulfill this requirement the following sentence and literature reference was incorporated into the introduction to this study report. “The recent report indicated that sports specialization among young competitors, that is, competitors who are between 11 and 13 years of age is a common practice (1). There-fore, any means of simplification of the accurate selection of the sports discipline for a competitor is of outmost importance. The use of anthropological parameters that allow the assignment of a competitor to a specific sports discipline is of crucial can be very helpful for discipline-specific achievements.”

It is unclear that is being in Table 3; the heading needs to be more specific. – in order to follow the text of the manuscript that is “The analysis of Table 3 revealed that the 'anthropometric aptitude' for wrestling could be predicted with precision between 99% and 95% compared to triple jump, badminton, and tennis. On the other hand, the lowest differentiation was observed with an accuracy of 76% between badminton and tennis players.” the table heading was changed to “The percentage of accuracy of differentiation between different sport disciplines using the DT approach.”

The discussion provides some interesting information, but it would be helpful if the authors could develop the practical implications and potential limitations of the study. – to satisfy this requirement the following sentence was incorporated into the conclusion section “The practical implication of the presented reports includes direct application in daily coaching practice. However, for such purpose, the easily understandable reference table needs to be constructed.”

English was reviewed.