Cycling time trial performance during different phases of the menstrual cycle

Submaximal exercise performance has not previously been assessed in the late follicular phase of the menstrual cycle, which is associated with a pre-ovulatory surge in oestrogen. Therefore, we compared cycling time trial performance during the early follicular (EF), late follicular (LF) and mid-lute...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:European journal of applied physiology 2005-06, Vol.94 (3), p.268-276
Main Authors: Oosthuyse, Tanja, Bosch, Andrew N, Jackson, Susan
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Bicycling
Estrogens - blood
Exercise Test
Female
Follicular Phase
Humans
Luteal Phase
Menstrual Cycle - physiology
Menstruation
Physical Education and Training
Task Performance and Analysis
Time Factors
Women
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Summary:Submaximal exercise performance has not previously been assessed in the late follicular phase of the menstrual cycle, which is associated with a pre-ovulatory surge in oestrogen. Therefore, we compared cycling time trial performance during the early follicular (EF), late follicular (LF) and mid-luteal (ML) phase of the menstrual cycle in trained and untrained eumenorrhoeic women who cycled 30 and 15 km, respectively, in a non-fasted state. The women completed the three cycling time trials on a conventional racing bicycle mounted on an air-braked ergometer. We required resting oestrogen to increase by at least twofold above EF phase values in both the LF and ML phases and this resulted in a number of exclusions reducing the sample size of each group. No significant difference was noted in the finishing time between the different menstrual phases in trained (n=5) or untrained (n=8) group, albeit limited by sample size. However, analysis of the combined trained and untrained group data (n=13) revealed a trend for a faster finishing time (P=0.027) in the LF phase compared to the EF phase as 73% of the subjects showed improvements with an average of 5.2+/-2.9% (or 2.1+/-1.1 min) in the LF phase (for alpha=0.05 requires P
ISSN:1439-6319
1439-6327
DOI:10.1007/s00421-005-1324-5