Thigh muscles electromyographic activity during lunge exercise to fatigue

Abstract

The position of lower limbs during lunge is different from squat without clear understanding on differences in muscle activation. The objective was to compare the electromyographic activity of the vastus lateralis (VL), vastus medialis (VM), biceps femoris (BF) and semitendinosus (ST) during the execution of the lunge to exhaustion of the lower limb, changing position of the legs frontally and posteriorly. Nine active women participated of this study with a mean (SD) age of 22 (3.4) years and body mass 60.3 (4.1) kg. The lunge was divided in two phases, changing the forward leg (random order). The electromyographic signals were captured by an eletromyograph, and the root mean square (RMS) values were analyzed during the concentric phase. There was a significant increase of the RMS in time for the LL positioned frontally and posterior (p< 0,001). For the forward position, the increase of RMS was 50% for VL, 54% for VM and 48% for BF. The backward position had an increase of 75% for VL, 113% for VM, 62% for BF and 48% for ST. The RMS was significantly higher for VM than for ST the forward position (p = 0,03) and ST and BF for the backward position (p = 0,02). No interaction was observed between time and muscle in the electromyigraphic activity. The normalized RMS was not statistically different comparing the forward and backward position of the dominant leg. Muscle activity was similar in both positions of the LL, showing increased activation of the VM and VL muscles in relation to the BF and ST.

Keywords

• motor activity
• muscle strength
• rehabilitation