Experimental Protocol of a Three-minute, All-out Arm Crank Exercise Test in Spinal-cord Injured and Able-bodied Individuals

Summary

We present a protocol to test the aerobic and anaerobic power of the upper body muscles over a duration of 3 min in able-bodied as well as in paraplegic and tetraplegic individuals. The protocol presents specific modifications in its application for upper-body exercise in individuals with or without disability.

Abstract

Reliable exercise protocols are required to test changes in exercise performance in elite athletes. Performance improvements in these athletes may be small; therefore, sensitive tools are fundamental to exercise physiology. There are currently many exercise tests that allow for the examination of exercise capacity in able-bodied athletes, with protocols mainly for lower-body or whole-body exercise. There is a trend to test athletes in a sport-specific setting that closely resembles the actions that the participants are used to performing. Only a few protocols test short-term, high-intensity exercise capacity in participants with an impairment of the lower body. Most of these protocols are very sport-specific and are not applicable to a wide range of athletes. One well-known test protocol is the 30 s Wingate test, which is well-established in cycling and in arm crank exercise testing. This test analyzes high-intensity exercise performance over a 30 s time duration. In order to monitor exercise performance over a longer duration, a different method was modified for application to the upper body. The 3 min, all-out arm crank ergometer test allows athletes to be tested in a manner specific to 1,500 m wheelchair racing (in terms of exercise duration), as well as to upper body exercises such as rowing or hand-cycling. In order to increase the reliability with identical test conditions, it is crucial to precisely replicate settings such as the resistance (i.e., torque factor) and the position of the participants (i.e., the height of the crank, the distance between the crank and the participant, and the fixation of the participant). Another important issue concerns the beginning of the exercise test. Fixed revolutions per minute are required to standardize the test conditions for the start of the exercise test. This exercise protocol shows the importance of accurate operations to reproduce identical test conditions and settings.

Introduction

There are several exercise tests that accurately determine the increase in exercise performance in elite athletes over the course of a training period^1,2,3,4,5. One of these tests is the reliable 3-min all-out exercise test on a braked cycling ergometer^3,4,5,6. This test was used to determine critical power, but it was also applied to exercise testing with athletes, as well as to ....

Protocol

The study was approved by the local ethical committee (Ethikkommission Nordwest- und Zentralschweiz, Basel, Switzerland), and written informed consent was obtained from the participants before starting the study.

1. Test Preparation and Participant Instruction

1. Arm crank ergometer
   1. Turn the power on the rotation speed-dependent arm crank ergometer before opening the software.
   2. Choose the test protocol for the 3 min, all-out ergometer test.
      1. Insert a new protocol with a 120 s warmup, 180 s of test duration, and a 720 s cooldown period. Choose this test protocol and open a new part....

Results

The test-retest reliability was checked in 21 recreationally trained (but not specifically upper-body trained), non-smoking individuals (9 males, 12 females; age: 34 ± 11 years; body mass: 69.6 ± 11.1 kg; and height: 175.5 ± 6.9 cm). Table 1 shows the results for the relative and absolute test-retest reliabilities¹². The peak power compared between the test and retest is presented in Figure 1¹². A Bland Altm.......

Discussion

Exercise testing in spinal-cord injured athletes is crucial to tracking exercise performance over several months or years of training. Only a few exercise tests exist to check short-term, high-intensity exercise performance on the arm crank ergometer. This method describes in detail how an exercise test that was already examined for its reliability in cycling⁵ and rowing⁷ might be applied to the arm crank ergometer. To collect reliable and meaningful results, two factors ar.......

Materials

List of materials used in this article

Name	Company	Catalog Number	Comments
Angio V2 arm crank ergometer	Lode BV, Groningen, NL	N/A	arm crank ergometer
Lode Ergometry Manager Software	Lode BV, Groningen, NL	N/A	Software
10 µl end-to-end capillary	EKF-diagnostics GmbH, Barleben, Germany	0209-0100-005	Capillaries
haemolysis cup	EKF-diagnostics GmbH, Barleben, Germany	0209-0100-006	hemolysis cup
lactate analyzer	Biosen C line, EKF-diagnostics GmbH	5213-0051-6200	lactate analyzer
Heart rate monitor, Polar 610i	Polar, Kempele, Finland	P610i	heart rate monitor
metabolic cart, Oxygen Pro	Jaeger GmbH	N/A	metabolic cart
oxygen mask, Hans Rudolph	Hans Rudolph Inc. , USA	113814	oxygen mask
statistical software, PSAW Software	SPSS Inc., Chicago USA	N/A	statistical software
desinfectant, Soft-Zellin	Hartmann GmbH, Austria	999979	desinfectant
Quality control cup, EasyCon Norm	EKF-diagnostics GmbH, Barleben, Germany	0201-005.012P6	quality control
Quality control cup 3mmol/L	EKF-diagnostics GmbH, Barleben, Germany	5130-6152	control cup
Chip sensor lactate analyzer	EKF-diagnostics GmbH, Barleben, Germany	5206-3029	chip sensor
Lactate system solution	EKF-diagnostics GmbH, Barleben, Germany	0201-0002-025	lactate system solution
lancet, Mediware Blutlanzetten	medilab	54041	lancet
Calibration gas,	Jaeger GmbH	36-MC G020	calibration gas
chair provided by distributor (ergoselect)	ergoline GmbH, Germany	N/A	chair provided by distributor