Muscle activation levels during the Push-Up exercise on stable and unstable surfaces.

• Autor(a) principal: Vila-Chã, Carolina
• Data de Publicação: 2017
• Outros Autores: Ribeiro, Luis, Serra, Nuno, Costa, Mário, Conceição, Filipe, De Paz, Juan
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10314/3808

Introduction: The push-up (PU) is one of the most common strength exercises commonly used in the strength training programs for the upper body. Because Since it is limited to by the body weight, fitness trainers use several alternativesexercise types (e.g. unstable surfaces) have been developed in order to increase the activity activation of the involved muscles. This includes variants with unstable surfaces. This study aims aimed to analyze the changes in the muscle activity pattern induced by either performing PU exercise performed on a stable surface (on the ground) or an unstable surface (on a BOSU®). Methods: Eleven voluntary male subjects (age, mean ± SD: 21.9 ± 4.2 yrs.), familiarized with the push-up’s exercises, has have been recruited for this study. Is was asked to the subjects toSubjects performed firstly 5 repetitions of each push-up exercise (stable vs. unstable surfaces. Electromyographic activity (EMG) from the agonist muscles (clavicular, sternal and chondral portion of pectoral major, triceps brachii and anterior deltoid), antagonist muscles (latissimus dorsi and biceps brachii) and the stabilizer muscles (serratus anterior, superior trapezius, external oblique and erector spinae) has been collected with 11 wireless surface electrodes. and, simultaneously, has been collected kKinematic data. was also recorder to interpret technical execution. Results: The results showed that, from the agonist musclesgroup, only the magnitude of activation of the triceps brachii has been affected by the exercise type (p < 0.001). In the unstable PU the triceps brachii showed higher activation levels than in stable surface (70.13 ± 29.03% and 58.62 ± 25.31%, respectively). Regarding to the antagonist muscles behaviorgroup, the unstable PU exercise induced a higher activity of the brachial biceps and of the latissimus dorsi compared to the stable PU exercise (p <0.05 for both muscles). In additionFinally, for stabilizer muscles, it was observed that , during unstable PU, the upper trapezius activation was, on average, 37.79% higher than in the stable exercise (p <0.01) during unstable PU). Instead, for the serratus anterior, the activation level was, on averaged, significantly higher in the unstable PU exercise than in the stable PU (+ 14.71%, p = 0.01). For the external oblique there were no differences in muscle activity between exercise typess (p = 0.23). However, the activity of the erector spinae was significantly higher in unstable PU exercise (p = 0.01). Conclusion: Thesee results indicate that performing the push up exercise performed on an unstable surface (BOSU®) changes the pattern of activation of antagonist muscles, shoulder stabilizer muscles and agonist muscles, particularly the brachial triceps activation.