Sports and environmental temperature: From warming-up to heating-up

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Abstract

<p id="d7019721e209">Most professional and recreational athletes perform pre-conditioning exercises, often collectively termed a ‘warm-up’ to prepare for a competitive task. The main objective of warming-up is to induce both temperature and non-temperature related responses to optimize performance. These responses include increasing muscle temperature, initiating metabolic and circulatory adjustments, and preparing psychologically for the upcoming task. However, warming-up in hot and/or humid ambient conditions increases thermal and circulatory strain. As a result, this may precipitate neuromuscular and cardiovascular impairments limiting endurance capacity. Preparations for competing in the heat should include an acclimatization regimen. Athletes should also consider cooling interventions to curtail heat gain during the warm-up and minimize dehydration. Indeed, although it forms an important part of the pre-competition preparation in all environmental conditions, the rise in whole-body temperature should be limited in hot environments. This review provides recommendations on how to build an effective warm-up following a 3 stage RAMP model (Raise, Activate and Mobilize, Potentiate), including general and context specific exercises, along with dynamic flexibility work. In addition, this review provides suggestion to manipulate the warm-up to suit the demands of competition in hot environments, along with other strategies to avoid heating-up. </p>

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American College of Sports Medicine position stand. Exercise and fluid replacement.

Michael N Sawka, Louise M Burke, E Randy Eichner … (2007)

This Position Stand provides guidance on fluid replacement to sustain appropriate hydration of individuals performing physical activity. The goal of prehydrating is to start the activity euhydrated and with normal plasma electrolyte levels. Prehydrating with beverages, in addition to normal meals and fluid intake, should be initiated when needed at least several hours before the activity to enable fluid absorption and allow urine output to return to normal levels. The goal of drinking during exercise is to prevent excessive (>2% body weight loss from water deficit) dehydration and excessive changes in electrolyte balance to avert compromised performance. Because there is considerable variability in sweating rates and sweat electrolyte content between individuals, customized fluid replacement programs are recommended. Individual sweat rates can be estimated by measuring body weight before and after exercise. During exercise, consuming beverages containing electrolytes and carbohydrates can provide benefits over water alone under certain circumstances. After exercise, the goal is to replace any fluid electrolyte deficit. The speed with which rehydration is needed and the magnitude of fluid electrolyte deficits will determine if an aggressive replacement program is merited.

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G. Robert J. Hockey (1997)

This paper presents a cognitive-energetical framework for the analysis of effects of stress and high workload on human performance. Following Kahneman's (1973) model, regulation of goals and actions is assumed to require the operation of a compensatory control mechanism, which allocates resources dynamically. A two-level compensatory control model provides the basis for a mechanism of resource allocation through an effort monitor, sensitive to changes in the level of regulatory activity, coupled with a supervisory controller which can implement different modes of performance-cost trade-off. Performance may be protected under stress by the recruitment of further resources, but only at the expense of increased subjective effort, and behavioural and physiological costs. Alternatively, stability can be achieved by reducing performance goals, without further costs. Predictions about patterns of latent decrement under performance protection are evaluated in relation to the human performance literature. Even where no primary task decrements may be detected, performance may show disruption of subsidiary activities or the use of less efficient strategies, as well as increased psychophysiological activation, strain, and fatigue after-effects. Finally, the paper discusses implications of the model for the assessment of work strain, with a focus on individual-level patterns of regulatory activity and coping.

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Carbohydrates for training and competition.

Louise M Burke, John A Hawley, Stephen Wong … (2011)

An athlete's carbohydrate intake can be judged by whether total daily intake and the timing of consumption in relation to exercise maintain adequate carbohydrate substrate for the muscle and central nervous system ("high carbohydrate availability") or whether carbohydrate fuel sources are limiting for the daily exercise programme ("low carbohydrate availability"). Carbohydrate availability is increased by consuming carbohydrate in the hours or days prior to the session, intake during exercise, and refuelling during recovery between sessions. This is important for the competition setting or for high-intensity training where optimal performance is desired. Carbohydrate intake during exercise should be scaled according to the characteristics of the event. During sustained high-intensity sports lasting ~1 h, small amounts of carbohydrate, including even mouth-rinsing, enhance performance via central nervous system effects. While 30-60 g · h(-1) is an appropriate target for sports of longer duration, events >2.5 h may benefit from higher intakes of up to 90 g · h(-1). Products containing special blends of different carbohydrates may maximize absorption of carbohydrate at such high rates. In real life, athletes undertake training sessions with varying carbohydrate availability. Whether implementing additional "train-low" strategies to increase the training adaptation leads to enhanced performance in well-trained individuals is unclear.