Complex Training Methods Research Articles

An Enhanced Two-Way Unet Approach for Copy Move Image Forgery Detection

The paper explores a deep learning-based approach to semantic classification, emphasizing its utility in complex real-world situations. The main aim is to engineer a model that can recognize features in images and distinguish them accurately and efficiently. Leveraging advanced architectures, including convolutional neural networks (CNNs) and their variants, the research combines complex training methods with advanced datasets to achieve the state-of-the-art Includes conceptual techniques and data enhancement methods to the model's capability to generalize to diverse has greatly impressive images. The report describes typical improvements in accuracy and loss coefficients at various stages, and highlights the importance of fine-tuning hyperparameters Analytical metrics such as accuracy, accuracy, loss, and validation loss reveal high model performance displayed, balanced in terms of computational efficiency and classification quality Alongside envisioning predictive coverage, the report offers qualitative and quantitative evidence for on how effective the model is This approach holds particular promise for applications such as autonomous driving, surveillance, and medical imaging. The findings also highlight the importance of continuous innovation in model construction and training techniques to push the limits of logical classification.

Yewen, O., Widiyanto, W., Padli, P., Sabillah, M. I.., Zarya, F.., Haryanto, J.., Geanta, V. A.., Ndayisenga, J.., Falahudin, A.., Salahudin, S., Furkan, F., & Ardiansyah, A.. (2024). Aumento de la potencia muscular de las piernas y la fuerza muscular de los brazos de los atletas de baloncesto: a través de método de entrenamiento complejo y entrenamiento de peso corporal

Yewen, O., Widiyanto, W., Padli, P., Sabillah, M. I.., Zarya, F.., Haryanto, J.., Geanta, V. A.., Ndayisenga, J.., Falahudin, A.., Salahudin, S., Furkan, F., & Ardiansyah, A.. (2024). Aumento de la potencia muscular de las piernas y la fuerza muscular de los brazos de los atletas de baloncesto: a través de método de entrenamiento complejo y entrenamiento de peso corporal en circuito (Increased leg muscle power and arm muscle strength of basketball athletes: through complex training method and circuit body weight training). Retos, 60, 1213–1221. https://doi.org/10.47197/retos.v60.107239 Retraction of the article by the editor of the journal. There has been several clear and conclusive proofs that there has been a manipulation of the authorship of the article. The accepted Word document was sent with the names of the authors that appeared in the “Corrections for the edition” message so that they could only make the orthographical corrections that were necessary. The corresponding author (or whoever hurt him) changed the authors of the aforementioned Word document that was sent to them, returning a document together with these corrections made with new authors, all without any express notification, without any document explaining the changes made accepted by all the authors and, of course, without express authorization from the journal Retos between both moments. With this fraudulent document the galleys were made and the article was definitively published, assigning it the corresponding DOI. Authors in the Word document of the article submitted for review: 9 Authors in the published PDF with modified authors: 12 Differences between the authors between both moments: +6 y -3 (Additions: Widiyanto, Jeki Haryanto, Japhet ndayisenga, Ardhika Falaahudin, Salahudin, Furkan. Eliminated: Bernadeta Suhartini, Khairani Faizah, Salahudin Salahudin)

Fidelity Assessment Tool for a Dementia Carers’ Group-Psychotherapy Intervention

Context: The systematic evaluation of a practitioner’s adherence to and competence in delivering psychotherapeutic interventions can be complex. This study describes the development of a fidelity assessment tool for the Reitman Centre CARERS Program (RCCP), a carer group-psychotherapy intervention with multiple didactic and clinical components. The tool’s value in informing psychotherapy training and best practices for practitioners from diverse professional settings is examined. Methods: The RCCP Fidelity Assessment Tool (RCCP-FAT) was developed following an iterative process of item writing and checking. Seven components of the RCCP—Group Structure, Dementia Education, Problem-Solving Techniques, Therapeutic Simulation, Vertical Cohesion, Horizontal Cohesion, and Overall Global Rating—were assessed, with three to eight items, and a “global score” assigned to each. Fifteen trained raters were paired up to rate 36 RCCP sessions using the RCCP-FAT. Rater agreement, correlation between itemized and global scores, and correlation between global ratings and RCCP participants’ satisfaction were calculated. Results: A total of 1188 RCCP-FAT items were rated by each of the two rater groups. Rater agreement was calculated to be 54.3% (κ = 0.32; 95% CI, 0.02681–0.3729). A positive correlation was found between the itemized and global scoring for four RCCP components evaluated (R = 0.833 to 0.929; p < 0.01). The global score and the participants’ satisfaction with “Simulation” was also positively correlated (R = 0.626, p < 0.01). Conclusions: The study provided evidence for fair rater agreement for all RCCP-FAT assessment items. More importantly, the process of developing the tool systematically crystallized the clinical elements of the RCCP and helped to standardize the training methods by creating a framework for providing feedback to learners that matches the items on the RCCP-FAT. The use of the RCCP-FAT to guide the training and mentoring of incoming group leaders is essential in the scaling and dissemination of a complex training method like the RCCP to ensure fidelity to the original evidence-based intervention.

Acute Effects of Fast vs. Slow Bench Press Repetitions with Equal Time Under Tension on Velocity, sEMG Activity, and Applied Force in the Bench Press Throw.

Background: The tempo of resistance exercises is known to influence performance outcomes, yet its specific effects on post-activation performance enhancement (PAPE) remain unclear. This study aimed to investigate the effects of fast versus slow repetitions at a load of 70% of one-repetition maximum (1-RM) in the bench press exercise, focusing on velocity, surface electromyographic (sEMG) activity, and applied force while equating time under tension on bench press throw performance. Methods: Eleven men (age: 23.5 ± 5.4 years, height: 1.79 ± 0.04 m, body mass: 79.1 ± 6.4 kg, maximum strength 1-RM: 91.0 ± 12.0 kg) participated. Two experimental conditions (FAST and SLOW) and one control (CTRL) were randomly assigned. Participants performed two sets of six repetitions as fast as possible (FAST condition) and two sets of three repetitions at a controlled tempo (SLOW condition) at half the concentric velocity of FAST, as determined in a preliminary session. Before and after the bench press participants performed bench press throws tests (Pre, 45 s, 4, 8, and 12 min after). Results: sEMG activity and peak force during the bench press were higher in FAST vs. SLOW conditioning activity (p < 0.001), with time under tension showing no significant differences between conditions (p > 0.05). Mean propulsive velocity (MPV) during the bench press throw improved equally in both FAST and SLOW conditions compared with baseline from the 4th to the 12th min of recovery (FAST: +6.8 ± 2.9% to +7.2 ± 3.3%, p < 0.01, SLOW: +4.0 ± 3.0% to +3.6 ± 4.5%, p < 0.01, respectively). Compared to the CTRL, both conditions exhibited improved MPV values from the 4th to 12th min (p < 0.01). Peak velocity improvements were observed only after the FAST condition compared to the baseline (p < 0.01) with no differences from SLOW. For all muscles involved and time points, sEMG activity during bench press throws was higher than CTRL in both experimental conditions (p < 0.01), with no differences between FAST and SLOW. Peak force increased in both FAST and SLOW conditions at all time points (p < 0.05), compared to CTRL. Conclusions: These findings suggest that post-activation performance enhancement is independent of movement tempo, provided that the resistive load and total time under tension of the conditioning activity are similar. This study provides valuable insights into the complex training method for athletes by demonstrating that varying tempo does not significantly affect post-activation performance enhancement when load and TUT are equated.

Article RETRACTED due to manipulation by the authors Increased leg muscle power and arm muscle strength of basketball athletes: through complex training method and circuit body weight training

This study aims to analyze: (1) The effect of complex training methods and circuit body weight training on increasing leg muscle power and arm muscle strength of basketball athletes and (2) the difference in the influence between complex training methods and circuit body weight training on increasing leg muscle power and arm muscle strength of basketball athletes. This type of research is an experiment with the design of two groups pre-test and post-test. The sample in this study amounted to 70 athletes taken using random sampling techniques. The subjects were divided into 2 groups of athletes, namely the group given the complex training method of as many as 35 athletes and the group of athletes given the circuit bodyweight training method of as many as 35 athletes. The instruments used are to measure leg muscle power, namely the vertical jump test, and to measure hand muscle strength using an expanding dynamometer. The data analysis technique used is an independent sample t-test followed by a paired sample t-test. The results showed that: 1) There was a significant effect of complex training methods and circuit body weight training on increasing leg muscle power and arm muscle strength of basketball athletes with a significance value smaller than 0.05 (p &lt; 0.05). 2) There is a significant difference in influence between the groups given the complex training method and circuit body weight training on increasing leg muscle power and arm muscle strength of basketball athletes, it is proven that the average value of leg muscle power in the athlete group given the complex training method is 143.5 kg/sec while the average value of leg muscle power in the circuit body weigh training method group is 120.5 kg/sec with an average difference in post-test 23 kg/sec. Furthermore, the average value of arm muscle strength in the complex training method group was 38.00 kg while the average value of hand muscle strength in the circuit bodyweight training method group was 32.10 kg with an average post-test difference of 5.9 kg. So it can be concluded that the basketball athlete group given the complex training method treatment has better leg muscle power and arm muscle strength compared to the circuit bodyweight training group. Keywords: complex training, circuit bodyweight training, basketball, leg muscle power, arm muscle strength.

Implementing Complex Training Method: Its Effects on Endurance, Speed, Power, and Agility of Adolescent Basketball Players

Implementing Complex Training Method: Its Effects on Endurance, Speed, Power, and Agility of Adolescent Basketball Players

Multi-sample dual-decoder graph autoencoder.

Self-supervised learning has shown superior performance on graph-related tasks in recent years. The most advanced methods are based on contrast learning, which severely limited by structured data augmentation techniques and complex training methods. Generative self-supervised learning, especially graph autoencoders (GAEs), can prevent the above dependence and has been demonstrated as an effective approach. In addition, most previous works only reconstruct the graph topological structure or node features. Few works consider both and combine them together to obtain their complementary information. To overcome these problems, we propose a generative self-supervised graph representation learning methodology named Multi-View Dual-decoder Graph Autoencoder (MDGA). Specifically, we first design a multi-sample graph learning strategy which benefits the generalization of the dual-decoder graph autoencoder. Moreover, the proposed model reconstructs the graph topological structure with a traditional GAE and extracts node attributes by masked feature reconstruction. Experimental results on five public benchmark datasets demonstrate that MDGA outperforms state-of-the-art methods in both node classification and link prediction tasks.

Effects of a Velocity-Based Complex Training Program in Young Female Artistic Roller Skating Athletes.

Complex training consists of a near maximal strength effort followed by a biomechanically similar explosive exercise. One of many complex training methods that have been proposed is the French Contrast Method. The aim of this study was to analyze the effects of the French Contrast Method on maximal strength and power of young female artistic roller skating athletes with the help of velocity-based training to prescribe the intervention program. Eighteen female artistic roller skating athletes, divided into an experimental group (EG) and a control group (CG), participated in this study. The EG performed complex training via the French Contrast Method. The CG did not perform any additional training besides their regular roller skating practices. All participants were tested on the 1-RM back squat and hip thrust, the load-velocity profile assessment of both exercises previously stated, the countermovement jump, and the drop jump. A significant increase in mean concentric velocity (MCV) of the hip thrust exercise from 10 to 60% of 1-RM in the EG was observed. Significant differences between groups were observed for the MCV of the hip thrust from 10 to 90% of 1-RM. There were also significant increases in the 1-RM back squat and 1-RM hip thrust over time in the EG. For the vertical jump variables, there were significant differences between groups for both contact time and the reactive strength index with and without an arm swing. The results of this study suggest that a 6-week training intervention with the use of the French Contrast Method can significantly improve maximal strength and power.

Does Complex Training Enhance Vertical Jump Performance and Muscle Power in Elite Male Volleyball Players?

The authors aimed to compare the effects of 4 weeks jump versus complex training methods on lower limb muscle power and maximal isokinetic torque of knee extensors and flexors in elite male volleyball players. Sixteen male volleyball players were allocated into 2 groups, jump training (n = 8; 27.0 [5.7]y, 94.3 [7.6]kg) and complex training (with induction of postactivation performance enhancement, n = 8; 26.6 [3.6]y, 94.2 [6.3]kg). All individuals performed jump training 2 sessions/wk, and the complex group received induction training with postactivation performance enhancement and jump training. After 4weeks, an increase in countermovement jump height (jump: 49.0 [1.2] to 52.7 [2.1]cm and complex: 49.2 [1.1] to 53.3 [1.9]cm; P = .009) and power (jump: 29.5 [1.1] to 34.3 [1.4]W and complex: 30.4 [0.9] to 34.4 [1.08]W; P = .001) was observed without significant differences between groups and without significant group × time interaction (P > .05). Also, no significant difference was observed between and within groups for the isokinetic peak torque at low speeds (60 and 180°s), although total muscle work and knee extensor/flexor ratio increased from pretraining to posttraining at 300° seconds similarly in both groups. The findings indicate that jump performance and power, knee extensor/flexor ratio, and total muscle work increased after 4weeks of jump and complex training. However, the inclusion of heavy resistance stimulus did not elicit any additional improvements in the vertical jump performance and isokinetic strength of elite volleyball players.

Application of Biomechanics Based on Intelligent Technology and Big Data in Physical Fitness Training of Athletes.

Physical training has a high degree of participation all over the world. With the opening of the era of national fitness, physical training has become more popular from the original specialization, and the complex training methods and contents have gradually become simplified. The development and change of physical training has also brought many problems to the professional training of athletes, such as high training intensity but poor effect, insufficient training posture, and long-term physical injury. In order to help athletes achieve better results in physical training and reduce the probability of injury, taking sprint training as an example, this article adopted the sports and body data of elite athletes through intelligent technology and big data analysis, established a human motion model from the perspective of biomechanics, and then conducted a corresponding test run experiment for athletes. The experimental results suggested that drag resistance running could improve the specific strength quality of sprinting. At the same time, when using resistance load for training, the maximum speed should not exceed 90% of the maximum speed without resistance. The average horizontal maximum velocity decreased by approximately 9% when training under a resistance load, and the best training results were obtained by training athletes within this range.

Contemporary Approaches to Physiological Adaptations after Taper Workouts

This study was conducted to systematically compile and sythesize the studies about taper training in literature and in the most current form, to reveal the physiological changes caused by taper trainings. Qualitative research methods were used for in-depth study and interpretation of the studies on taper applications published between 1985-2020. Document analysis was used as data collection method and the obtained data were analyzed by content analysis method. Taper training is a complex training method that facilitates the systematic reduction of the training load and the attainment of the physiological harmony. Before the major competitions the reductions in load, density, volume or frequency of the training in order to achieve optimal performance are made which is called the taper. The aim of taper training is to reduce fatigue and increase physiological adaptation and performance in athletes through intensive training. Since each sport branch has different physiological demands, taper trainings are applied differently in individual and team sports. The effects of these practices may vary in athletes in different branches. In the literature studies, some increases were found in the blood volume and red blood cells values, muscular glycogen deposits, some enzymes, blood lactate and VO2 max. values and the movement economies of athletes. However, in some studies, some decreases were found in the levels of the respiratory threshold, creatine kinase in the blood and the values of the submaximal ventilation, the diastolic and systolic blood pressures of the athletes. Keywords: Taper training, athlete, performance improvement, physiological changes

Effects of Complex Functional Strength Training on Balance and Shooting Performance of Rifle Shooters

The purpose of this research was to study the effects of complex functional strength training (whole-body vibration + unstable surface training) on overall shooting performance, including the shooters’ stability of hold, time on target, and the body sway. We compared the shooters’ performances at three time intervals: (a) pretraining, (b) 6 weeks post-WBV+UST, and (c) 6 weeks detraining. The study participants were eight rifle shooters. Training was c on an unstable surface with vibration frequency of 30 Hz and amplitude of 2 mm. Six weeks after complex training, participants’ shooting performance and body sway significantly improved. Specifically, shooting scores and total time improved by 5.50% and 7.34%, respectively, as did the DevTotal values between performances at different times: 10 ms (p = 0.01), 20 ms (p = 0.04), 30 ms (p = 0.02), and 40 ms (p = 0.02). The DevY values also showed significant differences between performances at different times: 10 ms (p &lt; 0.01), 20 ms (p &lt; 0.01), 30 ms (p &lt; 0.01), 40 ms (p &lt; 0.01), and 50 ms (p &lt; 0.01). A 6 week complex training method can effectively improve shooting stability, fluency, and scores.

Structure-Consistent Weakly Supervised Salient Object Detection with Local Saliency Coherence

Sparse labels have been attracting much attention in recent years. However, the performance gap between weakly supervised and fully supervised salient object detection methods is huge, and most previous weakly supervised works adopt complex training methods with many bells and whistles. In this work, we propose a one-round end-to-end training approach for weakly supervised salient object detection via scribble annotations without pre/post-processing operations or extra supervision data. Since scribble labels fail to offer detailed salient regions, we propose a local coherence loss to propagate the labels to unlabeled regions based on image features and pixel distance, so as to predict integral salient regions with complete object structures. We design a saliency structure consistency loss as self-consistent mechanism to ensure consistent saliency maps are predicted with different scales of the same image as input, which could be viewed as a regularization technique to enhance the model generalization ability. Additionally, we design an aggregation module (AGGM) to better integrate high-level features, low-level features and global context information for the decoder to aggregate various information. Extensive experiments show that our method achieves a new state-of-the-art performance on six benchmarks (e.g. for the ECSSD dataset: Fβ = 0.8995, Eξ = 0.9079 and MAE = 0.0489), with an average gain of 4.60% for F-measure, 2.05% for E-measure and 1.88% for MAE over the previous best performing method on this task. Source code is available at http://github.com/siyueyu/SCWSSOD.

The Effect of 8 Weeks of Complex Training Methods on the Countermovement Jump Performance

PURPOSE The purpose of this study was to find out whether a more specific stimulus, such as training which stimulates the production of power above 90% of Pmax (Pmax = maximal average concentric power output), is effective in enhancing the countermovement jump (CMJ) performance using the method of complex pairs or separate execution of the exercises in the complex pair (separate complex pair).METHODSThirty male students of the Faculty of Sports Studies were divided into 2 experimental (EX1, EX2) and 1 control group (CNTR). The experimental groups trained for 8 weeks using the complex training (CT) method twice a week with the same amount of repetitions for each exercise. The complex pair consisted of half-squat jumps with the intensity over 90% of Pmax and plyometric depth-jumps. EX1 trained using the complex pair method with the intracomplex rest interval of up to 15 seconds. EX2 trained all sets of the half-squat jumps first and then all sets of the plyometric exercise. We used non-parametric statistics and linear regression analysis to evaluate the effect on increasing the CMJ performance after the intervention program.RESULTSThere were no significant differences between the pre-test and post-test in any of the experimental groups (p &gt; 0.05), although there were significant differences between the weeks in EX1 and EX2 (p &lt; 0.05). The CMJ performance increased insignificantly (p &gt; 0.05) each week by 0.14 cm in EX1 and by 0.07 cm in EX2. CONCLUSIONThese results did not clearly show the application of the CT methods to be useful in enhancing the CMJ. In practice we recommend using the complex pairs to save training time and increase training intensity. However, an additional longer-term intervention experiment with a bigger sample size and groups randomized by the CMJ parameter (not by Pmax) is needed.

Complex training: Efektifitas Latihan Dalam Meningkatkan Power Otot Pada Atlet Bola Voli Remaja

Complex training is an exercise method that combines plyometrics with strength training. This exercise is an exercise used to increase muscle power. This study aims to determine the effect of training of complex training methods towards leg muscle power and arm muscle power for adolescent volleyball athletes. The method used in this study is an experiment with a control group pretest - post test design. Subjects in this study are 23 adolescent volleyball athletes (14-17 years old) with 12 males and 11 females, who are divided into two groups of experimental groups (n = 12) and control groups (n = 11) with randomized matched pair design based on the ranking of the vertical jump ability. Instrument used in this study is vertical jump test (leg power) and the medicine ball throw test (arm power). The data analysis technique uses the paired t-test with a significance level of α = 0.05. The results show that training using a complex training method provides a good benefit in improving leg and arm muscle power. Therefore, this method is appropriate for used by adolescent volleyball athletes that have had experience of weight training in improving muscle power towards adolescent volleyball athletes

Comparison of Effects on the Movement Velocity of Resistance, Pliometric and Complex Training Methods Applied to Martial Art

Bu çalışmanın amacı, dövüş sporcularına uygulanan direnç, pliometrik ve kompleks antrenman yöntemlerinin hareket hızına etkilerinin karşılaştırılmasıdır. Bu amaç doğrultusunda, çalışmaya katılmak için Gümüşhane Üniversitesi Beden Eğitimi ve Spor Yüksekokulu’nda öğrenim gören ve mücadele sporlarında aktif spor yaşantısını sürdüren 30 öğrenci rastgele olarak üç farklı deney grubuna (pliometrik, direnç, kompleks antrenman grubu) ayrıldı. Araştırmanın kontrol grubu Düzce Üniversitesi Spor Bilimleri Fakültesi’nde öğrenim gören 10 öğrenciden oluşturuldu. Katılımcılara hem ön-test hem de son-test ölçümlerinde kendi kilolarının %40 oranına karşılık olan dış yüklerde squat sıçraması egzersizi uygulandı ve ortalama hız (OH) değeri, ortalama itme hızı (OİH) değeri ve zirve hız (ZH) değeri dinamik ölçüm sistemi (T-Force dinamik ölçüm sistemi) vasıtasıyla elde edildi. Verilerin değerlendirilmesinde; Kolmogrov-Smirnov Normallik Testi, Kruskal Wallis ve Wilcoxon analiz yöntemleri kullanıldı. Analiz sonuçlarına göre, 8 haftalık pliometrik, direnç ve kompleks antrenmanlarından sonra gruplar arasında ağırlıklı squat sıçrama egzersizinde elde edilen OH, OİH, ZH değerleri bakımından istatistiksel yönden anlamlı bir farklılığın mevcut olduğu bulundu (p&amp;lt;0.05). Sonuç olarak, üç farklı kuvvet antrenman protokolünün de hız parametresini geliştirdiği ve gruplar arasında istatistiksel yönden anlamlı bir farklılık olduğu elde edildi.

Uticaj kompleksnog metoda treninga na ispoljavanje maksimalne izometrijske sile mladih košarkaša

During the period of ten weeks, a study has been conducted on the effects of a complex training method on the maximal isometric muscle force, its peaking time, and the rate of force development in the semi-squat test. The participants of the study were twenty junior basketball players (average age 16.4+/-0.7; mean body height 186.2cm+/-9.2; mean body weight 75,4+/-7.5kg; mean body fat percentage 12,83%+/-1.15). The participants were divided into experimental (n=10) and control group (n=10). The experimental group, besides technical-tactical training sessions, had additional complex training, while the control group had technical-tactical training sessions only. At the final testing, the results of maximal isometric muscle force and the explosive power index, have significantly improved in the experimental group, while the control group did not make significant progress. There were no significant changes in the maximal isometric muscle force's peak time at the final testing. The study findings indicate that application of the complex training method has positive effects on the development of maximal isometric force, and the rate of force development.

ФОРМИРОВАНИЕ УПРАВЛЕНЧЕСКОЙ ГОТОВНОСТИ БУДУЩИХ МЕНЕДЖЕРОВ К ПОВЫШЕНИЮ ИНДИВИДУАЛЬНОЙ ТРУДОВОЙ ОТДАЧИ РАБОТНИКОВ

Administrative readiness of future manager to an increase in employees’ individual labour efficiency is a current issue of modern economy. The author describes training process of future managers for the management of an increase in labour efficiency basing on the theory and methodology of professional education, as well as an experience of combined activity of the leading enterprises and business school. Using modeling method the author developed models: “Profile of an employee with the effective labor return”, “Current administrative issues in training the manager for an increase in individual labour efficiency”, “Professional knowledge and abilities of the manager on the conditions formation for employee’s effective labour efficiency”. Development of models was carried out on the basis of system-genesis. A variety of the used complex training methods performed a diagnostic function. That made it possible to verify the consistency of knowledge, the level and strength of the formed skills. The levels of preparedness of future managers for managing the employee’s labour efficiency were achieved on the basis of the developed criteria and monitoring.

The effects of using complex training method on muscular strength among male weightlifters

Journal of Sports Science and Physical Education 7(1): Received: 3 January 2018, Accepted: 10 February 2018 – Weightlifting is a sport that requires both dynamic strength and power. Until today, weightlifting coaches are still exploring different training modes in an attempt to enhance both muscular strength and power of the competitive weightlifters. Research has shown that the use of the “right” training method could further provide knowledge on such effect for competitive weightlifters (Storey & Smith, 2012). Thus, the aim of this study was to investigate the effects of using the complex training method (applicable to weightlifting) compared to traditional resistance training on muscular strength among male competitive (state level) weightlifters. Seventeen male competitive weightlifters were randomly assigned into 2 groups: experimental group (Complex Training; n = 9), and control group (Traditional Resistance Training; n = 8). All participants trained for 6 weeks (2 sessions per week) with the total training volume equated between both groups. Participants underwent pre-test and posttest including the anthropometric measurements (height, body weight, and body fat) and lower body strength (isokinetic strength test) parameters. The results showed that there was a significant increase from pre- to post-test in knee extension peak torque t(8) = -4.22; p = .003 and t(7) = -5.37; p = .001, and knee flexion peak torque t(8) = -5.98; p = .001 and t(7) = -4.20; p = .004 in experimental and control groups respectively. No significant difference (p > .05) was observed in knee extension peak torque (22.9 ± 16.3 versus 13.9 ± 7.3) and knee flexion peak torque (11.4 ± 5.7 versus 10.1 ± 6.8) improvements between the complex training group and control group respectively at post-test. In conclusion, the use of complex training method showed similar effects in enhancing muscular strength with traditional resistance training after 6 weeks of intervention. Keywords: complex training, strength, weightlifting

Throwing and catching movements exhibit post-activation potentiation effects following fatigue

Many sport and exercise activities require powerful movements of the upper body. Despite their importance, there is a paucity of research examining stretch-shortening cycle (SSC) activities occurring in the upper limbs. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of fatigue on throwing performance (height of throw) and biomechanical factors of the upper limbs (reactive strength index; hand contact time) using a specially constructed sledge apparatus for the upper body. Ten male subjects aged between 19 and 21 years performed a series of rebound throws (RBT) in a non-fatigued state to obtain a maximal baseline throw score. Subjects then performed a RBT fatiguing protocol on the upper body sledge followed by further RBT, at 15, 45, 120 and 300-seconds post fatigue. Markers on the subjects' limb and the sledge were analysed using Motion Analysis Corporation 3-D kinematic analysis system (200 Hz). Throwing height, contact time and reactive strength index were determined. Mean throwing height and reactive strength index showed significant decreases following fatigue and increases during recovery (p < 0.05). The results confirm the presence of post-activation potentiation (PAP) in RBT performance. This finding could be useful when optimising recovery periods in training or implementing complex training methods.