physiological profiling (running)

I'm Daniel Snape. I'm an applied physiologist as part of the health and performance hub here at Leeds Beckett University. So behind me at the Carnegie School of Sport building, we have a range of sport science services that we offer to recreational athletes through to elite athletes on a kind of national governing bodies.

Today, we're working with a female distance runner who's looking to do a running physiological profile assessment. So, what that involves is beforehand, she's completed an online health screening form and today, we do consent on arrival. We get kind of height, body mass, resting blood pressure to make sure we're kind of healthy and clear to do the assessment.

We also offer sports science services such as the resting metabolic rate assessment and a body composition scan or a DEXA assessment.

The protocol involves first, a submaximal incremental treadmill test.

We start at a kind of low intensity, and we increase the intensity every three minutes by 1kph. So during that time, we're collecting heartrate, rating the perceived exertion, and expired gas wearing the kind of face mask connected to the Metalyzer. What that allows us to measure then is the kind of like oxygen, carbon dioxide production, then looking at carbohydrate fat oxidation rates, the running economy, or the kind of oxygen costs of running across those range of sub-maximum speeds.

After each three-minute stage, we kind of have a 30-second rest period to get their blood lactate concentration, so that allows us to identify both their blood lactate, kind of, lactate threshold, lactate turn point, but also their ventilatory thresholds. We then, after the submax test, we have a 10-minute break period, and then we go into a kind of short incremental treadmill test to measure their V02 max, or their maximum oxygen consumption, and we do that until the athlete reaches volitional exhaustion, and that takes about eight to 12 minutes, and that then completes the running physical profile assessment.

Also, the kind of lactate threshold or the fractional utilisation of your lactate threshold at V02 max and your running economy, they're key determinants of endurance performance, so we can profile you as a runner, but also give you maybe the achievable speed for a kind of a marathon, half-marathon 10k, and if you're really kind of doing that close to a race period.

On the website, you can book the assessments directly, or you can book an online consultation which is free to speak with one of the physiologists or sports scientists here to discuss your requirements.