The stretch shortening cycle is a movement in skeletal muscle that involves lengthening and then immediately contracting, providing more strength and power for activities like throwing and jumping. Researchers are exploring how it works and how it can be used to improve athletic performance and assist physical therapy patients. The cycle can be seen in natural human movements like walking and running, and can be refined with exercise to build stronger leg muscles.
The stretch shortening cycle is a form of movement in skeletal muscle where it lengthens and then immediately contracts. This seems to provide more strength and power for activities like throwing and jumping. Some human movements naturally exhibit a stretch-shortening cycle, and it can also be seen in specific techniques used in sports to increase power for athletic performance. The researchers are exploring how the phenomenon works, using human and animal models to learn more about the function of skeletal models.
Initially, the stretch-shortening cycle involves an eccentric movement, where the muscle is lengthened and stretched. An example can be seen in the winding used before throwing a ball in some sports. After the muscle is stretched, it immediately shortens in a concentric movement, generating power for pushing, throwing, or other movement. One theory about this type of movement is that it essentially turns the muscle into a spring.
Concentric movements alone tend not to be as powerful as a movement in the shortening cycle of the stretch. Someone just throwing a ball, for example, may not have as much power as a pitcher who has made a closeout first. Athletes can be taught to incorporate this cycle to their advantage in training, and use a variety of tools to develop strong, flexible muscles capable of large extensions and rapid, powerful contractions. Active stretching before movement can be seen in various sports.
Natural human movements also show evidence of the stretch shortening cycle. Walking and running, for example, incorporate a certain degree of extension and stretch before a contraction to push the foot off the ground. The articulation of the bones in the leg facilitates this, adding power to the step. Jumping also uses a similar cycle, with people stretching their legs and then squatting down to get up off the ground. Athletes can refine this with exercise to build their leg muscles, making their stride longer and their gait more explosive.
Research on this phenomenon may help scientists understand how skeletal muscle works. This can be valuable for activities such as developing better athletic training tools and assisting physical therapy patients, where muscle weakness can make it difficult to control movement. Studies on muscle fatigue can also explore the stretch-shortening cycle to learn more about how it contributes to the development of tiredness and tension, with the goal of finding new ways to limit fatigue in endurance-critical environments, such as gyms. marathons.
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