Badminton players show a lower coactivation and higher beta band intermuscular interactions of ankle antagonist muscles during isokinetic exercise

摘要

Previous studies have suggested that skilled athletes may show a specific muscle activation pattern with a lower antagonist coactivation level. Based on the point, we hypothesize that the coupling of antagonistic muscles may be different between badminton players and non-skilled individuals during exercises. The current work was designed to verify the hypothesis. Ten male college students and eight male badminton players performed three maximal voluntary isometric contractions (MVC) and a set of three maximal concentric ankle dorsiflexion and plantar flexions at an angular velocity of 30 degrees, 60 degrees, 120 degrees, and 180 degrees/s. Surface electromyography (EMG) was recorded from the tibialis anterior (TA) and lateral gastrocnemius (LG) muscles during the test. Normalized average EMG amplitude and phase synchronization index (PSI) between surface EMG of TA and LG were calculated. Antagonist muscle coactivation was significantly lower (from 22.1% +/- 9.4 and 10.7% +/- 3.7 at 30 degrees/s to 22.4% +/- 9.7 and 10.6% +/- 2.5 at 180 degrees/s for non-players and badminton players group, respectively), and PSI in beta frequency band was significantly higher (from 0.42 +/- 0.06 and 0.47 +/- 0.15 at 30 degrees/s to 0.35 +/- 0.12 and 0.49 +/- 0.14 at 180 degrees/s) in the badminton player group compared with the non-player group during isokinetic ankle dorsiflexion contraction. No significant difference was found in antagonist muscle coactivation and PSI between two group subjects during ankle plantar flexion. The decrease of antagonist coactivation may indicate an optimal motor control style to increase the contraction efficiency, while the increase coupling of antagonistic muscles may help to ensure joint stability to compensate for the decrease of antagonist coactivation.