Benefits of EMS on your body

Regular exercising is extremely healthy for the body, however, modern life-style, work, health and all sorts of other problems often prevent us from training regularly.
If exercising is irregular or not intense enough, the muscles lose their qualities and performance (mass, strength, resistance, vascularization, elasticity, contractile efficiency). This happens to all the large muscles and, in particular, to motor muscles, such as quadriceps, femur biceps, soleus, both calf muscles, buttocks, postural muscles such as abdominal and para vertebral muscles. Moreover, an inadequate physical condition associated with lack of training enhances accident risks. Those who wish to have fun while practicing sports and not suffer too much from pains and aches, must therefore be in good physical conditions.

The STIMFIT electrical muscle stimulator affects and betters muscular functions as happens with physical exercise: it enhances mechanical muscle properties such as strength, resistance, dimension and ductility of muscle fibers, metabolic mechanism of muscle cells, etc.. It therefore affords benefits which as very similar to those obtained from voluntary training.

The STIMFIT electrical muscle stimulator enables impressive results, which may vary in accordance to each person’s needs. To tone up and remodel the body, enhance sports performance, or more simply, return to a fit condition and keep it up easily, thus bettering quality of life.

The STIMFIT electrical muscle stimulator enables:

  • enhance muscular contractile properties
  • enhance and keep up muscle strength and power
  • enhance muscle resistance against fatigue and intense physical efforts
  • better muscle elasticity and suppleness
  • enhance vascularization
  • massage, de-fatigue and relax muscles
  • accelerate muscular recovery after intense physical activity

Thanks to the STIMFIT EMS device even those who do not have much time for exercising, will be able to practice their favorite sport and be fit at all times: not only will their sports’ skills be benefited, but the risk of accidents related to “lack of training” will be reduced and sports will be more “enjoyable” because pain-free. The STIMFIT will instead become a professional athlete’s best ally to optimize the quality of his/her daily training session.

Furthermore, the antalgic and relaxing features of the STIMFIT EMS device, make it possible to prevent the onset of aches and chronic contractures, especially along the lumbar tract, particularly exposed both for professionals and amateurs alike. It will therefore not be necessary to suspend training activities periodically owing to muscular pains and aches.

EMS can do three things that are beyond the brain’s capabilities:

  1. EMS can recruit and synchronize more than traditional exercise of the muscle fibers in any muscle group, to perform work or exercise. In response to traditional exercise, the brain typically recruits only less than 40% of the muscle fibers.
  2. EMS can create more muscle activity in muscles being worked. The brain has a “limiting switch” that always keeps some of the muscle in reserve for an emergency in which certain hormones like Adrenalin are released, speeding the heart rate, slowing digestion, pushing blood flow to major muscle groups, and changing various other autonomic nervous functions, giving the body a burst of energy and strength.
  3. EMS can target specific muscle fibers, depending on the frequency: slow twitch, fast twitch, very fast twitch fibers… the brain cannot discern between these fiber types. Different activities require use of different fibers.

Type of Benefits

  • Recruitment of fast-twitch fibers. The “size principle” or the “Henneman’s Law” determines the way muscles respond during exercise or activity. The smallest motor units (slow twitch) are activated first because of their low action potential. These are endurance muscle fibers. As demand on the muscle increases and the need for more strength, the larger motor units (fast twitch) begin to activate. With EMS this can be reversed; the fast twitch muscles can be activated first, initiating maximal eccentric movements which also focus on the fast twitch muscle fibers. This is great news to those athletes who are required to perform maximal eccentrics and plyometrics, which can be hard on the joints and nervous system. By using EMS, athletes can reduce the volume of this type of training session and get better results with less risk of injury. This also good news for people that just want to build strength, endurance or recover faster.
  • Increase in muscle strength. Numerous studies have shown significant strength gains with EMS. Using an EMS unit for 10 minutes three times a week for three weeks, sprinters gained 52% in strength. (Rattan and Cometti) Boxers using EMS on the triceps had strength gains of 18.5% in the same three weeks with a similar protocol. (Champion and Poulson) In addition, several studies have shown a cross-education benefit whereby an untrained limb gained strength when the opposite limb was trained with EMS, just as it would with traditional exercise (Motor Control, 1999, 3,205-21 9).
  • Muscle mass gains. Studies have also shown muscle hypertrophy in healthy athletes using EMS. In one study, competitive triple jumpers had size gains of 4 to 8% in the quadriceps in 3 weeks, 2-4 times better result than the control group. (Turostowski,et al. 1991) Competitive wrestlers experienced a 4.5% improvement in muscle mass after a 3-week EMS program. (Gillet and Cometti 1990) Other studies have shown that EMS training can produce more “good” micro-trauma than concentric training, therefore leading to more growth. Moreau et al. (1995), Kim at al. (1995)
  • Increase in vertical jump/power. A study was conducted to test the impact of EMS training (3 weeks of training, 3 sessions per week, 10 minutes of stimulation of the quadriceps per session). They tested for quadriceps strength, squat jump (jump from a static start), and counter-movement jump (jump with a dip). The experimental group trained only with EMS, while the control group trained only with regular strength methods. In both groups, quadriceps strength increased after 3 weeks of training (11.45% for the EMS group and 3.65% for the lifting group), squat jump performance improved (11.14% for the EMS group and 3.45% for the lifting group), but counter-movement jump (CMJ) performance decreased slightly in both groups. However, after cessation of the EMS training there was a rebound effect causing CMJ performance to significantly increase. Research concludes that EMS increases the muscle’s capacity to produce power, however it neglects the impact of the stretch-shortening cycle (that’s the reason for an increase in squat jump and not in CMJ). We can hypothesize that adding a stretch-reflex regimen to the EMS program would lead to great gains in all power parameters. In fact, this is what research shows. A study by Maffiuletti et al. (2002) found that EMS and plyometric training used in the same training session (repeated 3 times per week for 4 weeks) produced gains in both counter-movement jump (8-10%) and squat jump (21%).
  • Speed increases. Since EMS impacts the fast twitch fibers, there is good reason to believe that it improves speed. Proper stimulation of the muscles involved in running – quadriceps, rectus femoris, hamstrings, calves, and the gluteals is vital to avoid strength imbalances.
  • Muscle recovery. When EMS is utilized in sub-tetanic frequency, the pulsation acts like a massage, meaning no contractions but rather electric massaging, increasing blood flow, releasing endorphin, causing muscle relaxation and helping to breakdown adhesion between fibers. During recovery, EMS can be used to speed up the muscles ability to perform at high levels. A study (Gregory) showed that active recovery by EMS is effective in removing lactate after exhaustive exercise. Compared to post-exercise rest or light aerobic activity to help the body recover, EMS recovery showed a tendency toward a longer all-out effort than the other forms of recovery.
  • Work beyond your limits. Psychological, muscular and cardiovascular fatigue are all factors that limit your achievements in any traditional training. With EMS programs, an athlete can effectively work localized muscles aerobically or anaerobically even after they have finished a traditional training session. EMS training can also be used before traditional training to “pre-fatigue” certain muscle groups before lifting. (ONFITNESS VOL 5 NO 4 2004)

Want to learn more about the principles of Electrical Muscle Stimulation. Click HERE.