COMPARISON OF SLIDEBOARD, TREADMILL, AND CYCLE EXERCISE TO PEAK AEROBIC CAPACITY AND TRAINING 1234

Abstract

The peak cardiorespiratory response to slideboard (SB), treadmill (T), and cycle (CE) ergometer exercise was evaluated prior to and following 6 wks of slideboard training (SBT) in untrained (UnTr, n=5), previously trained (PTr, n=6), and control (C, n=6) subjects. SBT was added to current training program of PTr. Peak VO2, heart rate (HR), blood lactate (La), and exercise test time were similar pre-post training for C. Peak HR (X±SD) were sig. lower (p<.05) for CE (180±10 bpm) vs T (194±9 bpm) and SB (193±7 bpm) regardless of group. Peak La were similar for each mode of exercise, but sig. lower (p<.05) in C vs PTr for T (7.3±1.5 vs 9.1-±1.2 mM) and SB (7.2±1.2 vs 8.8±1.3 mM) and tended to increase (p=.06) for UnTr on SB pre-post SBT. For each mode, peak VO2 was sig. greater (p<.05) for PTr vs UnTr and C. Regardless of group, peak VO2 was sig. greater (p<.05) for T vs CE (56.2±6 vs 52.0±4 ml·kg-1·min-1) and similar for T vs SB (56.2±6 vs 54.5±6 ml·kg-1·min-1). Peak VO2 sig. increased (p<.05) for UnTr on SB (45.7±6 vs 52.5±3 ml·kg-1·min-1) and tended to increase (p=.07) on T and CE pre-post SBT. Peak VO2 tended to increase(p=.06) for PTr on all modes. These results suggest that SB can elicit peak cardiorespiratory responses similar to T and CE and short-term SBT can result in sig. increases in exercise-specific peak VO2.