The Effect of the Nordic Hamstring Exercise and Kinesio Taping on the Hamstring Strength and Sprint Performance in Collegiate Sprinters

The invesitgators performed a randomized controlled trial on collegiate sprinters to explore the combined effect of the NHE and KT and randomly allocated the subjects into the experimental (NHE+KT) or control (NHE) group by an independent researcher using the sealed envelopes method.

To calculate the sample size, a Cohen's d effect size of 0.4, an alpha level of 0.05, a test power of 0.95 were configured to G*Power software, at least 34 samples were computed. Considering the dropouts, 40 male collegiate sprinters were enrolled, explained the procedures of this study and voluntarily written informed consent. Inclusion criteria was that participants must be male, aged 18 years or older, training at the university level at least 4 times per week, with no history of lower limb injury within the last 6 months and no previous experience of the NHE or KT. Participants who had lower limb mobility limitation or injury especially HSI within 6 months and associated musculoskeletal, respiratory or cardiovascular diseases and was allergic to kinesio tape were excluded.