Cardiorespiratory Fitness
Conditions
Keywords
sprint interval training, maximal oxygen consumption, training intervention
Brief summary
The goal of this study is to learn how the number of weekly exercise sessions affects improvements in fitness in healthy university aged students. The main question it aims to answer is how training frequency affects improvements in fitness. Participants will complete a pre-testing sessions to assess fitness level and sprint performance. Following this participants are assigned to one of four groups. A group that exercises 2 days a week, a group that trains 3 days a week, a group that trains 4 days a week, or a no-exercise control group. Participants in this group will not complete any training and allow the researchers to compare the exercise groups to a group that didn't train. Each participant will train for 4 weeks. During each training session participants will complete 4-6 30 second all-out sprints with 4 minutes of rest between each. Participants will complete the same tests they did during the pre-testing session following the 4 weeks of training to see how frequency affects improvements.
Interventions
OTHERExercise Intervention
Participants will complete an exercise intervention where they will exercise 2, 3, or 4 days per week for 4 weeks.
Sponsors
Wilfrid Laurier University
Study design
Allocation
NON_RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
SINGLE (Outcomes Assessor)
Masking description
All pre- and post-testing is completed by researchers not involved in training, and thus are blinded to which group participants are assigned to. This prevents any potential bias when researchers are completing post-testing sessions.
Intervention model description
Following pre-testing participants are assigned to one of the four groups based on their baseline cardiorespiratory fitness to ensure no differences between groups at baseline. Participants will train 2, 3, or 4 days a week, or be assigned to the control group (no training) and re-test following the 4 week intervention.
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
18 Years to 35 Years
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
* Recreationally active: exercising at least 2-3 days per week and not currently involved in, or had been involved in a systematic training program for at least 3 months prior to data collection. * Safe to become physically active based on the Canadian Society for Exercise Physiology - Get Active Questionnaire.
Exclusion criteria
* Smoking * Consuming supplements known to affect metabolism (e.g., creatine, carnitine, nitric oxide, brain chain amino acids). * Failure to meet inclusion criteria
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Cardiorespiratory fitness | This will be assessed before and after 4 weeks of training (or control). | Cardiorespiratory fitness will be assessed through the measurement of maximal oxygen consumption. This will be determined using an incremental exercise test to volitional fatigue on a treadmill. A metabolic cart will be used to assess oxygen consumption using indirect calorimetry |
Secondary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Anaerobic performance | This will be assessed before and after 4 weeks of training (or control). | Anaerobic performance will be assessed during one 30 second all-out sprint completed on a self-propelled treadmill. Participants will be instructed to run as fast and as hard as they can for the entire 30 seconds. Speed will be recorded during this sprint and used to determine, peak, average, and minimum speed, as well as fatigue index. |
Countries
Canada
Contacts
Primary ContactTom J Hazell, PhD
Outcome results
None listed