William W. Edwards

High intensity training-induced changes in skeletal muscle antioxidant enzyme activity

These experiments tested the hypothesis that high intensity (interval) training is superior to moderate intensity (continuous) exercise training in the upregulation of antioxidant enzyme activity in skeletal muscle. To test this postulate, we examined changes in oxidative and antioxidant enzyme activities in rat skeletal muscle following 12 wk of either interval (6 x approximately 5-min intervals at approximately 80-95% VO2max) or continuous (45 min at approximately 70% VO2max) exercise training. Both continuous and interval training resulted in significantly elevated (P < 0.05) succinate dehydrogenase (SDH) and 3-hydroxyacyl-CoA-dehydrogenase (HADH) activities in the gastrocnemius (G) and soleus (S) muscles compared with controls. SDH and HADH activities in the G and S muscles did not differ between the two exercise groups. Glutathione peroxidase (GPX) activity exceeded controls (P < 0.05) in only the interval trained S muscle. Soleus superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity was higher (P < 0.05) in both exercise groups compared with controls. No differences in SOD activity existed between interval and continuous trained animals. We conclude that when matched for oxygen cost, interval and continuous exercise training result in similar increases in SOD activity. However, high intensity interval exercise is superior to moderate intensity continuous exercise in the promotion of GPX activity in the S.

Endurance training-induced increases in expiratory muscle oxidative capacity.

Recent evidence demonstrates that endurance exercise training improves the oxidative capacity of the major mammalian inspiratory muscle (e.g., costal diaphragm). In contrast, no data exist concerning the effects of exercise training on abdominal expiratory muscles. We tested the hypothesis that 12 wk of endurance exercise training would significantly increase the activity of selected beta oxidation and Krebs cycle enzymes of abdominal expiratory muscles of the rat. To test this hypothesis two groups of female Sprague-Dawley rats were studied: group 1, continuous exercise training (n = 13); and group 2, sedentary control (n = 6). Exercise trained animals ran 5 d.wk-1 on a motorized treadmill for 45 min.d-1 at approximately 75-80% VO2max. When compared with controls, exercise training resulted in elevated (P less than 0.05) activities of 3-hydroxy-acyl-Co-A dehydrogenase (HADH) and citrate synthase (CS) in two abdominal expiratory muscles (rectus abdominus and external obliques). In contrast, training did not alter (P greater than 0.05) CS or HADH activity in the internal obliques/transversus abdominus muscles. In general, the training-induced increases in expiratory muscles CS activity were relatively small (approximately 10-13%) when compared with the training-induced increase in CS activity in the plantaris muscle (approximately 44%). These data demonstrate that continuous exercise training results in small but statistically significant improvements in the oxidative and beta oxidation capacities of expiratory muscles.