Herein, we analyse by experimental techniques the human kicking thrust and measure the effect of a
warm-up routine that includes post-activation potentiation (PAP) sets on front-crawl flutter kick thrust,
kinematics, and performance. Sixteen male competitive swimmers with 22.13 ± 3.84 years of age were
randomly assigned in a crossover manner to undergo a standard warm-up (non-PAP; control condition)
and a warm-up that included PAP sets (PAP; experimental condition) consisting in 2 5 repetitions of
unloaded countermovement jump. Participants performed a 25 m all-out trial in front-crawl with only
flutter kicks eight min after each warm-up. Kinetics (i.e., peak thrust, mean thrust, and thrust-time integral)
and kinematics (i.e., speed, speed fluctuation and kicking frequency) were experimentally collected
by an in-house customized system composed of differential pressure sensors, speedo-meter, and underwater
camera. Peak thrust (P = 0.02, d = 0.66) and mean thrust (P = 0.10, d = 0.40) were increased by 15%
in PAP compared to non-PAP. Large and significant differences were noted in speed (P = 0.01, d = 0.54)
and speed fluctuation (P = 0.02, d = 0.58), which improved by 10% in PAP compared with non-PAP. In conclusion, a warm-up that includes PAP sets improves kicking thrust, kinematics and performance.
This research was funded by NIE AcRF Grant (RI 6/17TB)
