Children have lower size-normalised maximal voluntary force, speed, and power than adults. It has been hypothesised that these and other age-related performance differences are due to lesser type-II motor-unit utilisation in children. This should be manifested as slower force kinetics in explosive muscle contractions. The purpose of this study was to investigate the nature of child–adult force-kinetics differences and whether the latter could support that hypothesis. Untrained boys (n = 20) and men (n = 20) (10.1 ± 1.3 and 22.9 ± 4.4 years, respectively), performed maximal, explosive, isometric elbow flexions and knee extensions on a Biodex dynamometer. Peak torque (MVC), times to 10–100% MVC, and other kinetics parameters were determined. The boys’ body-mass-normalised knee extension MVC, peak rate of torque development, and %MVC at 100 ms were 26, 17 and 23% lower compared with the men and their times to 30% and 80% MVC were 24 and 48% longer, respectively. Elbow flexion kinetics showed similar or greater differences. The findings illuminate boys’ inherent disadvantage in tasks requiring speed or explosive force. It is demonstrated that the extent of the boys–men kinetics disparity cannot be explained by muscle-composition and/or musculo-tendinous-stiffness differences. We suggest therefore that the findings indirectly support children's lower utilisation of type-II motor units.

A high rate of force development (RFD) is often more important than maximal force in daily and sports activities. In children, resistance training has been shown to increase maximal force. It is unclear whether, or to what extent, can children improve RFD and force kinetics. For this study, we compared strength and force kinetics of boy gymnasts with those of untrained boys and untrained men. Eight boy gymnasts (age, 9.5 ± 1.2 y), 20 untrained boys (age, 10.1 ± 1.3 y), and 20 untrained men (age, 22.9 ± 4.4 y) performed maximal, explosive, isometric elbow flexions (EF) and knee flexions (KF). Peak torque (maximal voluntary contraction (MVC)), elapsed times to 10%-100% MVC, peak rate of torque development (RTDpk), and other kinetics parameters were determined. When gymnasts were compared with untrained boys, size-normalized EF MVC was 11%-20% higher, RTDpk was 32% higher, and times to 30% and 80% MVC were 16% and 55% shorter, respectively (p < 0.05). No corresponding differences were observed in KF. Furthermore, although the normalized EF MVC was 28% lower in gymnasts than in men (p < 0.001), their torque kinetics parameters were similar. These findings highlight the specificity of gymnastics training, which markedly elevated the torque kinetics of young, prepubertal boys to adult levels, but only moderately affected peak torque. It is suggested that neurologic adaptations, such as enhanced firing and activation rates or increased type II motor-unit recruitment, as well as changes in musculotendinous stiffness, could explain these findings.