Comparing position sense and isokinetic strength of the muscles of elbow joint between aikidokas and non-athlete people

BACKGROUND: Aikido is a martial art comprises of locking techniques and falls. During the locking techniques, the elbow joint is forced into extended position. Moreover, the elbow hits the ground during the falling techniques. These might compromise joint position sense (JPS). The objectives of this study were to compare JPS and strength of the muscles of elbow joint between Aikidokas and a non-athlete group and to evaluate the correlation between JPS and muscle strength among Aikidokas. METHODS: All male Jiyushinkai style Aikidokas and a healthy matched non-athlete group participated in this cross-sectional study. Passive JPS at a speed of 4°/s and the isokinetic strength of elbow flexors and extensors were assessed. RESULTS: Evaluating the isokinetic parameters revealed no significantly difference between the groups in either flexion or extension at speeds of 60 (P-value range: 0.2–0.99) and 120 °/s (P-value range: 0.05–0.96). Also, the groups had no significant difference regarding different types of reconstruction error including constant error (P-value range: 0.38–0.91), variable error (P-value range: 0.09–0.87), and total variability (P-value range: 0.30–0.80). Moreover, very weak to weak correlation was observed between isokinetic parameters and passive JPS (r-value range: 0.01–0.39). CONCLUSIONS: JPS was not impaired in Aikidokas in spite of the repetitive stress applied to the elbow joint during the performance of Aikido techniques. The lack of significant difference in isokinetic between Aikidokas and healthy non-athletes, and the absence of an acceptable correlation between IPS and muscle strength in Aikidokas, might be attributed to the soft nature of Aikido.