The effect of post-activation potentiation on drop jump performance in female volleyball players

Abstract

Recent studies have aimed to establish a reliable application of Post-activation potentiation to specific explosive sports activities. If effective, PAP can be incorporated in the training regimes for competitions and can help achieve better results. However to date, there is no uniform agreement about the optimal acute recovery required between the heavy resistance training and subsequent muscle performance to gain performance benefits. In this study, we will examine potentiation after a dynamic voluntary contraction for the drop jump on female volleyball players immediately after CC; then, we allow for two minutes and four minutes respectively of recovery. Twelve participants were chosen from the University of Balamands Volleyball team. They performed the drop jump exercise three times, each separated by two minutes then proceeded to complete a set of jumping split squats using 20% load of their 1RM in the split squat exercise and repeated the drop jump immediately, 2 min and 4 min after the CC. The findings suggest that fatigue was dominant in the early stages of the test, but after allowing a few minutes of recovery, participants matched their previous results; however, no significant increase in performance was documented. The results of this study showed that the alternating split squat exercise using 20% load of 1RM failed to initiate PAP on the subsequent drop jump exercise.