The Monkey Man

Found this article while looking for something else
(It applied to my latest training)


Mitchondrial Biogenesis and Hypertrophy Relative to Thermal Stress

Increasing our body's efficiency to deal with respiratory and metabolic acidosis along with heat stress is adaptable through training that induces hypoxia and doing so gradually over time in the heat. The resulting adaptation in all muscle fibers is hypertrophy and biogenesis of more mitochondria including some heat shock proteins that increase our capacity to endure environmental and work induced heat stress (20).

The increased branching of the mitochondria decrease the spatial kinetics necessary for metabolic capacitance and lactic acid oxidation. Concepts of training specificity should not be lost here. Football athletes do not have to condition like cross-country athletes to achieve the necessary adaptive stimuli. However, I am not sure how many people involved in designing lifting and conditioning protocols for power athletes factor in the importance of mitochondrial density with regard to impaired kinetics and clearance relative to dehydration and heat stress. This scenario is best exemplified in large Type IIx (fast twitch) muscle fibers due to the lower mitochondrial density where spatial diffusion kinetics are more critical to metabolic capacitance.

Dehydration and hyperthermia just seems to amplify what is turning out to potentially be a natural process of regional metabolic down regulation. Throw in an accelerated level of fatigue with the actions of epinephrine and a slick playing surface and you can even see some tetany in an athletes calves when the weather is relatively cool!

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The Monkey Man

Here's some more...

As we enter the summer or 2002, let's review the basic physiological stresses induced by a hot environment and how the body responds and adapts to them. And, more importantly, we will discuss the critical safety precautions that all coaches must keep at the forefront.


Acclimatization: Adapting to the Heat

Research has taught us that summer conditioning procedures are necessary for heat acclimatization purposes. We know that the training must be gradual, progressive, and prudently executed, with detailed attention paid to the environmental conditions.

Acclimatization is a process involving both physical and psychological adaptations to a new or changing environment. It may be a move from a cooler to warmer climate, or simply an adjustment from the mild temperatures of spring to the hot and humid conditions of summer.

An over-simplified explanation of the body's adjustment to external heat during exercise is as follows:

The cardiovascular system (CVS) will compensate for the heat by shunting blood to the skin. This will improve the body's ability to cool itself by dissipating internal heat, but it diminishes the blood supply to the working muscles. This "Catch 22" happenstance stresses the CVS to meet the competing demands of the thermoregulatory system and the requirements of muscle metabolism.

If the air temperature is mildly warm, the body can release a portion of the internal heat overload through sweat evaporation. When high humidity is coupled with warm air temperatures, the body's thermal stress is doubled and the body's ability to evaporate the sweat and cool itself may be stifled. This physiological dilemma is exacerbated if hydration is inadequate and/or the activity is prolonged - resulting in a convolution of heat-related problems.
Acclimatization can reduce the risks.

The process encompasses approximately 10-14 short, less intense training sessions in the warmer environment. The initial duration of the workouts should be between 20-30 minutes at a low to moderate intensity level with liberal fluid breaks. Also, there should be a gradual build-up in the frequency of the sessions. Our football training, for example, involves two days per week from mid-May through mid-June, before progressing to 3-4 days per week from mid-June through July.

In parts of the country that have extremely hot and humid climates, it would be wise to hold the initial workout sessions during a part of the day (early morning/early evening) when the conditions are milder. This will enable a gradual acclimatization to the variable conditions throughout the course of the day.

Heat acclimatization offers the following physiological benefits:
1) reduces heart rate
2) reduces core temperature
3) increases cutaneous (i.e., to the skin) blood flow and perspiration rate for economizing the cooling process
4) perspiration begins earlier, thus expediting the cooling process
5) decreases the loss of vital electrolytes (minerals such as sodium and potassium).

To summarize:

The gradual, systematic, and progressive steps of acclimatization will eventually produce well-conditioned athletes who have a much higher heat tolerance than their sedentary counterparts or those who rush blindly into summer conditioning drills.


~Ken Mannie~
Strength/Conditioning Coach
Michigan State University

(Too bad I don't have time, to follow guidelines like this)

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BruiseKnee

so before i go on www.dictionary.com 3 times for every sentence....is there a way you could simplify all that?

goandykid

yes please, if you could keep each word under 4 syllables thad b great.

The Monkey Man

Sorry, When you go looking for info sometimes...
You take what you can get

(As it was, none of it made much of a f$#k in relation to my training)

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