Acute responses of biomechanical parameters to different sizes of hand paddles in front-crawl stroke |
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| Authors: | Augusto Carvalho Barbosa Flávio De Souza Castro Milivoj Dopsaj Sérgio Augusto Cunha Orival Andries Júnior |
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| Institution: | 1. State University of Campinas, Sports Science Department , Campinas , Brazil augustocarvalhobarbosa@yahoo.com.br;3. Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, School of Physical Education , Porto Alegre , Brazil;4. University of Belgrade, Faculty of Sport and Physical Education , Belgrade , Serbia;5. State University of Campinas, Sports Science Department , Campinas , Brazil |
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| Abstract: | Abstract This study investigated the acute effects of different sizes of paddles on the force-time curve during tethered swimming and swimming velocity in front-crawl stroke. Fourteen male swimmers (20.0 ± 3.7 years; 100-m best time: 53.70 ± 0.87 s) performed two 10-s maximal efforts in tethered swimming to obtain peak force, average force, impulse, rate of force development, stroke duration and time to peak force. Swimming velocity, stroke rate and stroke length were obtained from two 25-m maximal swims. Both tests were repeated in five conditions: free swimming, wearing small (280 cm 2 ), medium (352 cm 2 ), large (462 cm 2 ) and extra-large (552 cm 2 ) hand paddles. Compared to free swimming, paddles provided significant increases of peak force (medium: 11.5%, large: 16.7%, extra-large: 21.7%), impulse (medium: 15.2%, large: 22.4%, extra-large: 30.9%), average force (medium: 5.1%, large: 7.5%), rate of force development (extra-large: 11.3%), stroke duration (medium: 9.3%, large: 11.8%, extra-large: 18.5%), time to peak force (medium: 11.1%, large: 15.9%, extra-large: 22.1%), swimming velocity (medium: 2.2%, large: 3.2%, extra-large: 3.7%) and stroke length (medium: 9.0%, large: 9.0%, extra-large: 14.8%), while stroke rate decreased (medium: –6.2%, large: –5.5%, extra-large: –9.5%). It is concluded that medium, large and extra-large paddles influence the force-time curve and change swimming velocity, suggesting these sizes may be useful for force development in water. |
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| Keywords: | hand paddles swimming propulsive force velocity tethered swimming |
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