Lara Carlson and Michael Lawrence co-author article published in ‘Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research’ with student Casey Cottle

Lara Carlson, Ph.D., FACSM, assistant professor in the Department of Applied Exercise Science and the Center for Excellence in the Neurosciences (CEN), and Michael Lawrence, M.S., motion analysis lab manager, co-authored an article with Casey Cottle, first author, a 2012 graduate of UNE’s Applied Exercise Science program and a current student in the Doctor of Physical Therapy program.

The article has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, the official research journal of the National Strength and Conditioning Association.

In the paper, the authors discuss sled towing as a popular method of training to shave precious seconds off of sprint times, noting that, in the past, researchers have struggled to identify a loading scheme that is most appropriate to improve sprint performance in the acceleration phase.

The purpose of the study was to examine different loading schemes of assigned percentages of body weight (BWT) to see if they would produce significantly greater propulsive ground reaction force impulse (GRF), peak propulsive GRF, or greater propulsive rate of force development (RFD) than in un-weighted sprint starts. The study concluded that loading with 20% BWT was sufficient to increase propulsive GRF impulse.