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1 The School of Physiotherapy, University of Sydney, Lidcombe, NSW, Australia
2 Prince of Wales Medical Research Institute, University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: J.Munn{at}fhs.usyd.edu.au.
Evidence that unilateral training increases contralateral strength is inconsistent, possibly because existing studies have design limitations such as lack of control groups, lack of randomization and insufficient statistical power. This study sought to determine if unilateral resistance training increases contralateral strength. 115 subjects were randomly assigned to a control group or one of four training groups that performed supervised elbow flexion contractions: either with one set at high speed, one set at low speed, three sets at high speed, or three sets at low speed. Training was 3x/wk for 6 wks with a 6-8 "repetition maximum" load. Control subjects attended sessions but did not exercise. Elbow flexor strength was measured with a one repetition arm curl before and after training. Training with one set at slow speed did not produce an increase in contralateral strength (mean effect of -1% or -0.07 kg, 95% CI: -0.42 to 0.28 kg, p = 0.68). However three sets increased strength of the untrained arm by a mean of 7% of initial strength (additional mean effect of 0.41 kg, 95% CI: 0.06 to 0.75 kg, p = 0.022). There was a tendency for training with fast contractions to produce a greater increase in contralateral strength than slow training (additional mean effect of 5% or 0.31 kg, 95% CI: -0.03 to 0.66 kg, p=0.08), but there was no interaction between the number of sets and training speed. We conclude three sets of unilateral resistance exercise produce small contralateral increases in strength.
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