The Effect of Different Post-Activation Potentiation Protocols on Peak Muscle Torque during Knee Extension

Post-activation potentiation is an important tool to utilize when trying to optimize exercise and sport performance. PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to analyze different protocol lengths to determine if the post-activation potentiation effect can still manifest after just 1 specific warm up set vs. multiple specific warm up sets. METHODS: Subjects included eighteen college students from Texas Lutheran University with a mean age of 21.67 years (+/-2.70), height of 66.68 inches (+/-3.12), and weight of 176.56 pounds (+/-44.77). The subjects started the first session with a GWU that manifested as a 5 minute walk on an incline treadmill. Subjects then underwent a pretest on the isokinetic dynamometer to test their maximum force production over 10 repetitions at a fixed speed (given 3 trial reps before the test). The second session was recorded with at least one day of rest in between and started with randomly assigning each participant to either 3 SWU set group or 1 SWU set group. Both groups underwent the same GWU of a 5 minute walk on an incline treadmill. Following this, the 3 SWU set group did 3 sets of leg extension at 30% of their 10 Repetition Maximum (12 repetitions total), 50% of their 10RM (8 repetitions), and 100% of their 10RM (4 repetitions). The 1 SWU set group did 1 set/1 rep of the leg extension exercise at 130% of their 10RM (1 repetition). RESULTS: The 3-set protocol had a mean percent change of 3.61% with a standard deviation of 8.86% from pretest to post protocol test. The 1 set/1 rep protocol had a mean percent change of 6.44% with a standard deviation of 11.1% from pretest to post protocol test. An independent samples t-test showed that results were not statistically significant with a given P value of 0.544 (greater than 0.05). CONCLUSION: Both the 1 specific warm up set and the multiple specific warm up set exhibited similar results, with neither group outperforming the other. These findings help us to continue to understand the relationship between how to initiate the post activation potentiation effect, and the time frame that it takes to receive peak performance enhancing benefits from it.