Original articles  EXERCISE PHYSIOLOGY AND BIOMECHANICS 

The Journal of Sports Medicine and Physical Fitness 2004 March;44(1):1-7

Copyright © 2009 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English

Determinants of repeated-sprint ability in well-trained team-sport athletes and endurance-trained athletes

Bishop D., Spencer M.

School of Human Movement and Exercise Science University of Western Australia Crawley, WA, Australia

Aim. To examine the importance of peak V.O2 in determining repeated-sprint ability (RSA), we recruited 20 well-trained females (10 team-sport athletes and 10 endurance-trained runners; mean SD peak V.O2: 3.3±0.2 L·min-1) who were homogenous with respect to peak V.O2 (mean difference = 0.05 L·min-1).
Methods. Tests consisted of a RSA cycle test (5×6-s max sprints every 30 s) and a peakV.O2 test. Venous and capillary blood was sampled immediately before and after the 5×6-s cycle test for the determination of hypoxanthine concentration ([Hx]), lactate concentration ([La-]) and pH; blood buffer capacity (ßblood) was also estimated.
Results. The team-sport athletes had significantly higher peak power for the 1st sprint (P1; W·kg-1), total work for 5×6-s sprints (Wtot; J·kg-1) and power decrement across the 5 sprints (Pdec), (p<0.05). There were also significant between-group differences for post-test values of [Hx], [La-] and pH (p<0.05). While there was no significant difference in ßblood between the 2 groups (p=0.10), there was a moderate effect (d=0.77).
Conclusion. These results suggest that factors in addition to peak V.O2 are likely to be important for RSA.