Abstract
The purpose of this study was to determine peak aerobic power and associated physiological responses in highly competitive spinal cord injured (SCI) paraplegic road racers. Seven (6 male and one female) active paraplegic (lesions T4-T12) road racers and 9 healthy untrained able-bodied males performed continuous graded arm crank ergometer tests to exhaustion for determinations of peak power output (PO), oxygen uptake (V02), pulmonary ventilation (VE), heart rate (HR), and respiratory exchange ratio (RER). Compared to able-bodied subjects, male paraplegic road racers elicited significantly (p ≤ .05) higher mean (± SD) peak levels of PO (141.6 ± 8.8 vs 111.4 ± 27.7 W), absolute V02 (2.72 ± .52 vs 2.22 ± .381/min), and V02 per unit of body weight (43.06 ± 7.4 vs 30.33 ± 4.3ml/kg/min). Although peak HR (180.3 ± 9.5 vs 173.2 ± 8.5 bpm) and VE (92.8 ± 17.2 vs 74.6 ± 20.31/min) tended to be higher for male paraplegic road racers than able-bodied subjects, the differences were not statistically significant. The female paraplegic road racer achieved the highest peak levels of PO (119 W) and V02 (1.991/min; 38.0ml/kg/min) reported to date for wheelchair-dependent women. These data suggest that intense physical training via wheelchair propulsion can markedly enhance upper body cardiovascular fitness in SCI paraplegics. However, the correlational analysis between 10 km time and peak V02 was nonsignificant (p > .05) indicating that factors other than peak upper body aerobic power may influence wheelchair road racing performance.
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Hooker, S., Wells, C. Aerobic power of competitive paraplegic road racers. Spinal Cord 30, 428–436 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1038/sc.1992.94
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/sc.1992.94