The purpose of the present study was exploring the effect of the aerobic, yoga and aerobic-yoga training modes on some of the factors of female students’ physical fitness. For that reason, 76 sedentary female students participated in the general physical education I classes held by Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran with an age range of 19-25 years who had not had any experience about selected training modes were voluntary selected. They were randomly and equally assigned to three experimental groups (aerobic, yoga and aerobic-yoga) and one control group. The subjects in experimental groups participated in certain exercises held during 14 weeks, two sessions of 60 minutes each per week. During this period, the subjects of control group participated in theoretical classes of physical fitness and had no organized exercise programs. At the end of exercises in experimental groups, in order to collect data, 1200-meter run, vertical jump, shuttle run, sit-ups and push-ups tests were used for assessing the factors of physical fitness. One-Way ANOVA and Post Hoc Tukey Test showed that the mean of total physical fitness and the factors of cardio-respiratory endurance, muscular strength and abdominal and upper body muscular endurance in aerobic, yoga, and aerobic-yoga groups compared to the control group were significantly higher (P<0.05). Also, the mean of agility in yoga and aerobic-yoga groups were significantly higher than aerobic and control groups (P<0.05). The results indicate that the selected training modes especially yoga exercises have improved the physical fitness and its factors among the female students. Therefore, it is recommended that these training modes to be used in instructional programs of general physical education I.

Keywords