Three minutes of all-out intermittent exercise per week increases skeletal muscle oxidative capacity and improves cardiometabolic health.

ABSTRACT: We investigated whether a training protocol that involved 3 min of intense intermittent exercise per week--within a total training time commitment of 30 min including warm up and cool down--could increase skeletal muscle oxidative capacity and markers of health status. Overweight/obese but otherwise healthy men and women (n = 7 each; age = 29±9 y; BMI = 29.8±2.7 kg/m2) performed 18 training sessions over 6 wk on a cycle ergometer. Each session began with a 2 min warm-up at 50 W, followed by 3×20 s "all-out" sprints against 5.0% body mass (mean power output: ∼450-500 W) interspersed with 2 min of recovery at 50 W, followed by a 3 min cool-down at 50 W. Peak oxygen uptake increased by 12% after training (32.6±4.5 vs. 29.1±4.2 ml/kg/min) and resting mean arterial pressure decreased by 7% (78±

SUBMITTER: Gillen JB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4218754 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature