Published In
Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
9-2021
Subjects
Center of gravity, Wrestling techniques
Abstract
Purpose: The objective of this study was to clarify the characteristics of the upper limb stretch reflex in wrestlers.
Methods: Ten wrestlers and 11 control subjects participated in the study. The experiment was divided into two sessions. In the extension perturbation session, participants either relaxed or flexed the elbow when they felt a perturbation (abrupt elbow extension induced by a dynamometer). This was done 30 times by each subject for both sessions. In the flexion perturbation session, participants also relaxed or extended the elbow when they felt a perturbation (abrupt elbow flexion). During the tasks, the stretch reflex was monitored by recording the surface electromyographic (EMG) activities of the right biceps and triceps brachii. The EMG reflex components were divided into three periods based on the time after the perturbation: M1=20 - 50ms, M2=50 - 80ms, and M3=80 - 100ms. The averaged background EMG activity just before the disturbance was subtracted from the EMG activity in each period. The resultant value was integrated to obtain reflex magnitudes of M1 - M3.
Result: For the triceps brachii, in the relaxation task, the wrestler group showed a significantly smaller value for M2 than did the control group. In the extension task, the wrestler group showed a significantly larger value for M3 than did the control group. There was no difference in M1 between the two groups. For the biceps brachii, there was no significant difference between any reflex components.
Conclusion: Our results suggest that high level wrestlers have specific characteristics of the long latency stretch reflex in the triceps brachii that are modulated in a situation-specific manner.
Rights
Copyright © 2021 The Author(s). Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc. on behalf of the American College of Sports Medicine.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, where it is permissible to download and share the work provided it is properly cited. The work cannot be changed in any way or used commercially without permission from the journal.
Locate the Document
DOI
10.1249/mss.0000000000002799
Persistent Identifier
https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/36630
Citation Details
Ito, S., Nakagawa, K., Nakajima, T., Iteya, M., Crawshaw, L., & Kanosue, K. (2022). Dynamic Control of Upper Limb Stretch Reflex in Wrestlers. Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise, 54(2), 313.