According to The Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research (2019) Fast – tempo music increases overall exercise tolerance and reduces neuromuscular fatigue. Wayne State University researchers in Detroit, evaluated the impact of fast music on neuromuscular fatigue and power output. Previous studies have shown that music could increase motivation and distract from feeling fatigued, but those studies did not measure the electromyographic (EMG) fatigue threshold of working muscles.
In this study the researchers looked at college age cyclists, used EMG and other biomarker information. In the music session, subjects listened in random order to multiple genre songs with tempos of 137-160 bpm. The results showed that when the subjects listened to music, they had higher maximal power output, less neuromuscular fatigue and greater exercise tolerance overall.
So, listen to those upbeat tunes to get your heart rate going!
Love this quote by “The Queen of Soul,” Aretha Franklin:
“Music does a lot of things for a lot of people. It’s transporting, for sure. It can take you right back, years back, to the very moment certain things happened in your life. It’s uplifting, it’s encouraging, it’s strengthening.”
Source: IDEA Fitness Journal