Maximum Lifting Capacity in Single and Mixed Gender Three-Person Teams

Abstract

Little information is available regarding isoinertial lifting ability in teams of two or more people. The relationship between the sum of individual lifts and the lifting capacity of a three person team was examined. Eleven men' and ten women were randomly combined into 18 teams for each of the following four combinations: three men (3M), three women (3W), two men with one woman (2M&1W), and one man with two women (1M&2W). While the absolute load lifted from floor to knuckle height decreased with a decrease in the number of males on the team, team lifting strength as a percentage of the sum of individual lifting strength was generally higher for single gender teams (91.0% for 3W and 85.0% for 3M) than for mixed gender teams (82.7% for 1M&2W and 74.4% for 2M&1W).

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