USAWA

by Al Myers

A topic that will be discussed at this year’s World Meeting at the World Championship will be the age adjustment. This was brought up last year and an IAWA committee was formed to investigate it and present a recommendation to the meeting this year.  The membership will be called on to vote on this, whether to make a change or keep things as they are.

This subject is very interesting to me as I hear arguments from both sides. Young lifters think the older lifters get too much adjustment, while the older lifters don’t feel like they get enough.  Formulas are always hard to develop and make completely fair as there are so many variables to consider.

I did a study of my own on three lifts.  I want to emphasize THIS IS NOT THE IAWA STUDY. It is merely a study which I did to satisfy my own curiosity on this subject. I think it is important that I have this information in hand in order to make an informative vote. I just collected some numbers and did a few calculations.  I am not doing this to try to “sway votes” one way or the other.  I just wanted to see what “the numbers” really show in regard to decreased lifting performance with age.

Objective:  To collect information from age group USAWA records, make USAWA and IAWA(UK) age corrections for comparison, and determine what correction for age group records are needed in order for the age group records to be the same as the overall records.

Design: I collected information from age group USAWA records in three lifts – Bench Press Feet in Air, Hack Lift, and the Zercher Lift. I picked these three lifts for these reasons: they  evaluate all areas of overall strength -pressing, pulling and squatting, and the data base for these records was full in regard to records in all weight classes and age divisions. I calculated an average of all weight class records within an age group so bodyweight adjustments would not be a factor in this study.  I utilized this formula to determine what correction is needed in order to adjust to the average of the Overall Record.

Assumptions: I used the USAWA and IAWA(UK) age correction for the top age of each division despite the record may have been set a younger age within the division. The record list does not provide that data.

Results:
All Records listed in pounds.

Age Group	Overall Record	USAWA Correction	IAWA(UK) Correction	Correction Needed
Overall	353	353	353	0%
40-44	280	294	305	26.1%
45-49	268	295	306	31.7%
50-54	246	283	293	43.5%
55-59	228	274	274	54.8%
60-64	209	261	270	68.9%
65-69	194	252	268	82.0%
70-74	167	225	247	111.4%
75-79	141	197	223	150.4%
80-84	116	168	195	204.3%

Age Group	Overall Record	USAWA Correction	IAWA(UK) Correction	Correction Needed
Overall	538	538	538	0%
40-44	465	488	507	15.7%
45-49	401	441	457	34.2%
50-54	382	439	455	40.8%
55-59	330	396	409	63.0%
60-64	320	400	413	68.1%
65-69	321	417	443	67.6%
70-74	304	410	450	77.0%
75-79	242	339	382	122.3%
80-84	168	244	282	220.2%

Age Group	Overall Record	USAWA Correction	IAWA(UK) Correction	Correction Needed
Overall	452	452	452	0%
40-44	372	391	405	21.5%
45-49	352	387	401	28.4%
50-54	339	390	403	33.3%
55-59	331	397	410	36.6%
60-64	296	370	382	52.7%
65-69	280	364	386	61.4%
70-74	246	332	364	83.7%
75-79	204	286	322	121.6%
80-84	180	261	302	151.1%

Summary:

Age Group	USAWA Correction	IAWA(UK) Correction	Data Range	Data Average
Overall	0%	0%	0%	0%
40-44	5%	9%	15.7% – 26.1%	21.1%
45-49	10%	14%	28.4% – 34.2%	31.4%
50-54	15%	19%	33.3% – 43.5%	39.2%
55-59	20%	24%	36.6% – 63.0%	51.5%
60-64	25%	29%	52.7% – 68.9%	63.2%
65-69	30%	38%	61.4% – 82.0%	70.3%
70-74	35%	48%	77.0% – 111.4%	90.7%
75-79	40%	58%	121.6% – 150.4%	131.4%
80-84	45%	68%	151.1% – 220.2%	191.8%

As you can clearly see, the USAWA and the IAWA(UK) age corrections do not keep up with the performance decrease with increased age for these three lifts that where selected from the USAWA Record List.  No calculations were done to determine the statistical significance of this study.