Answer
We have more muscle strength than we ordinarily need or use. The gluteus maximus, the largest muscle in the body, can generate up to 1,200 kg of tension. and in the average healthy man all muscles can potentially produce a total tension of nearly 25 tons.
Muscular strength depends on the following factors:
1. Size of muscles
The strength of a muscle depends primarily, but not exclusively, on size. Large muscles like the
gluteus maximus and the quadriceps femoris, can form many myosin -actin cross bridges and
therefore generate a great amount of tension.
2. Fascicle arrangement:
The pennate arrangement-- as in the quadriceps femoris-- is the strongest; the parallel
arrangement, as in the sartorius, is second in strength; the circular arrangement , for example, in
the obicularis oculi-- is the weakest.
3 Size of active motor unit.
Larger motor units generate stronger contractions than smaller motor units.
4. Motor unit summation
To get stronger contractions, the nervous system activates larger, and more motor units in the
process of motor unit summation.
Work Step by Step
5. Temporal Summation
Nerve impulses arrive at the muscle in in closely spaced series of APs . The greater the frequency the
stronger the contraction produced produced by summation.
6. Length-tension relationships. A muscle resting at optimal length will contract more strongly when stimulated that will a muscle that is stimulated in its contracted form or its stretched form.i
&. Fatigue. Rested muscles contract more strongly than fatigued ones.
