Hip torques and the effect of posture in side-stepping with elastic resistance.

Background: The way movement-based exercises affect targeted muscles is not always obvious. Side stepping with an elastic band around the forefeet is aimed at strengthening hip abductors and lateral rotator muscles, with the premise that it creates an external torque of adduction and medial rotation of the femur around the pelvis that needs to be counteracted by hip muscles. However, hip torques during this exercise have not been previously quantified.

Tensor fascia latae and gluteal muscles myoelectric responses to increasing levels of hip medial rotation torque.

Medial hip rotation is typically attributed to the tensor fascia latae (TFL) and lateral rotation, to the gluteus maximus. However, experimental studies in cadavers suggest that the TFL lacks a moment arm for medial rotation and that the gluteus maximus may act as hip medial rotator depending on the hip flexion angle. In order to address this contradictory thinking, we measured the myoelectric activity of TFL, gluteus medius and gluteus maximus (superior portion, GMaxS, and inferior portion, GMaxI) for increasing levels of medial rotation torque applied to the hip.

The "" Journal Club Series: Highlights on Recent Papers in Corrective Exercise.

We are glad to introduce the Journal Club of Volume Five, fourth Issue. This edition is focused on relevant studies published in the last few years in the field of corrective exercise, chosen by our Editorial Board members and their colleagues. We hope to stimulate your curiosity in this field and to share a passion for sport with you, seen also from the scientific point of view.

Influence of a Pilates exercise program on the quality of life of sedentary elderly people: A randomized clinical trial.

This study evaluated the influence of a Pilates exercise program on the quality of life (QOL) of sedentary elderly women. Twenty-four elderly women (aged 64.8 ± 3 years) participated in this study.