Efeito do alongamento no desempenho na força de resistência muscular em homens experientes em treinamento de força

Stretching is a common practice in strength training, especially, related to injury prevention and as a warm-up. Many studies have mentioned temporary loss of strength after stretching, raising questions about its effects on muscle performance. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate the influence of stretching on muscle strength performance in the vertical supine and Extensor chair exercises in men experienced in strength training. All subjects were submitted to an anthropometric evaluation, followed by maximal repetition test (MR) in the vertical supine and extensor chair for the load of 50% and 80% of the body mass, respectively, following in three steps: familiarization, execution without stretching and execution with previous stretching. The paired t-test was performed to compare the number of repetition without and with stretching prior to the MR test, considering significance level p ≤ 0.05 in all tests. The results showed that the test in the vertical bench press, without (26.3 ± 8.6 MR) and with stretching (23.9 ± 9.1 MR), showing a significant difference (p = 0.0081) and in the extensor chair, without (21.4 ± 5.8 MR) and with stretching (20.6 ± 5.4 MR), no significant difference (p = 0.6467). It is important to highlight that there is a great contradiction about the effect of stretching on strength training and it is expected through this work to encourage further research on this topic. It is concluded that stretching promotes temporary strength deficits, however, on a larger scale in the upper limbs.