Discussion
RPE, muscular endurance, muscle or muscle group, submaximal external resistances
This study aimed at investigating the effect of different music tempos (i.e., 140 beats·minPrevious studies examining the effects of listening to music during warm-up sessions on anaerobic performance have shown that fast music, with a tempo of > 120 to 140 beats·minIn taekwondo, the high-intensity nature of the combat pushes athletes to repeat powerful strikes at high speed to score and react quickly to avoid the opponent attacks [During the FSKT-10 s and TSAT, taekwondo athletes are required to perform at high intensity, with a significant demand for anaerobic metabolic energy, for a short bout duration. As a sensory stimulus, music serves to increase neural activity and affective states (i.e., arousal, motivation, mood state) [Fast and loud music would stimulate the listener by activating the central nervous system, independently of how the music is afterwards perceived [Considering perceived exertion, RPE appears to have a key impact on promoting effort after listening to warm-up music [Regarding the sex’ effects, we found greater performance in males than females with no significant interaction effect with conditions. Given that our measures were recorded in 4 among 5 conditions where music was used, this result prevents us to assume that the observed variations are due to the music stimuli. It was reported that muscular power (“The ability of a muscle or muscle group to exert a maximum amount of force in the shortest period of time”), neuromuscular fitness (“… refers to physical fitness components such as flexibility, muscle strength, muscle power, jumping ability, and speed.”), muscular endurance (“the ability to voluntarily produce force or torque repeatedly against submaximal external resistances, or to sustain a required level of submaximal force in a specific posture for as long as possible”), speed and agility were greater in male than female taekwondo athletes [The variation in sex’ physical responses to music stimulus shown in the above studies did not receive consensus from previous investigations using a warm-up music [The duration of the test phase is a feature that might account for the disparity in obtained results of previous studies [Finally, we acknowledge some limitations in the present study. The main one is the failure to assess the subjective perceived activation induced by the warm-up pre-selected music. Furthermore, despite some indications on the positive effect of high-tempo music on endurance exercise performance [