The purpose of this study was to assess the acute effects of static stretching on foot velocity at impact with a soccer ball. Eighteen Division I female soccer athletes underwent two test conditions separated by 48 hr. Each condition was randomly assigned and began by placing four retro-reflective markers on bony landmarks of the ankle (total of eight markers, four on each ankle). One condition was the no-stretch condition, in which each participant performed a self-paced jog for 5 min as a warm-up, and then sat quietly for 6 min before performing three maximal instep kicks into a net. The second condition was the stretch condition, which was identical to the no-stretch condition, except the participants performed a series of six randomly ordered stretches instead of sitting quietly for 6 min. Three-dimensional motion analysis was used to quantify the resultant velocity of the head of the 5th metatarsal immediately prior to foot impact with a soccer ball. The results of a dependent t test indicated that there was no significant difference between the no-stretch (18.34 ± 1.29 m/s) and stretch conditions (17.96 ± 1.55 m/s; p = .102, d = .3) Based on these findings, acute stretching performed one time for 30 s before maximal instep soccer kicking has no effect on the resultant foot velocity of Division 1A university female soccer players. Pre-event stretching performed in a like manner may best be prescribed at the discretion of the athlete.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UTAHS/oai:digitalcommons.usu.edu:etd-1598 |
| Date | 01 May 2010 |
| Creators | Workman, Craig D. |
| Publisher | DigitalCommons@USU |
| Source Sets | Utah State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | All Graduate Theses and Dissertations |
| Rights | Copyright for this work is held by the author. Transmission or reproduction of materials protected by copyright beyond that allowed by fair use requires the written permission of the copyright owners. Works not in the public domain cannot be commercially exploited without permission of the copyright owner. Responsibility for any use rests exclusively with the user. For more information contact Andrew Wesolek (andrew.wesolek@usu.edu). |
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