COMPARISON OF MALE AND FEMALE PEAK TORQUE USING A VARIABLE NUMBER OF REPETITIONS DURING A KNEE JOINT ISOKINETIC TEST

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to assess peak torque in males and females using a variable number of repetitions at five different isokinetic velocities. Sixty subjects, males and females, athletes and non athletes were tested on four separate occasions. Each testing session the subject executed a set number of repetitions, either 4, 6, 8, or 10, at velocities of 60, 120, 180, 240 and 300 o·s-1 with a 60 second rest period between each velocity set. The order of repetitions was randomly assigned. A 2 X 2 X 4 X 5 repeated measures ANOVA was used to analyze the data with α < .05. The independent variables were gender, athlete, repetitions, and velocity with peak torque as the dependent variable. The following were found to be significant: interaction between gender and velocity; athlete and velocity; velocity; gender; athlete/non athlete; but no significant differences in number of repetitions were found. Therefore, peak torque was demonstrated equally regardless of the number of repetitions. However, by carefully reviewing the data for females it was evident that the women athletes did not reach peak torque at any of the five velocities when they executed four repetitions. In the female non athletes only at the higher velocities did they reach peak torque with four repetitions. It was concluded that females may need more repetitions to achieve peak torque than their male counterparts and that this should be taken into account when they are being tested for strength.