A comparison of two anaerobic test measurement systems using an upper body Wingate test

This study aimed to compare performance measures acquired by two different Wingate Anaerobic Test systems; Cranlea and Monark. Twenty participants undertook 58 Wingate tests against a 4% body mass resistive load on a cycle ergometer adapted for arm cranking. Corrected peak power output (PP; W) was recorded using 1 rev min–1, 0.5, 1 and 5 s averages and mean power output (MP; W). The Cranlea system recorded the greatest PP (589 ± 267 W) compared with the Monark (546 ± 267 W; P < 0.001). The PP using all other methods was also greater for the Cranlea compared with the Monark system (P < 0.001) with mean differences of 55 ± 18 W for 1 s averages and 22 ± 18 W for MP. Correlations between all PPs were strong (r = 0.99 – 0.97; P < 0.001). In conclusion, although the Cranlea system provides a consistently greater corrected PP it may not be enough to substantially differentiate between systems.