endurance

The endurance corresponds to the physical resistance to fatigue. Endurance depends on factors such as the supply of energy, the extent of the muscles being stressed or vegetative parameters. Cardiovascular diseases significantly reduce endurance.

What is the persistence?

Physical endurance corresponds to the resistance an organism has to physical fatigue and physical stress. Endurance in the narrower sense is the motoric ability to maintain a certain intensity over a certain period of time without feeling physically excessive fatigue or losing the ability to regenerate.

A good endurance usually ensures a higher intensity of movements, which allows a more efficient use of energy. In addition to endurance, athletic techniques and skills, such as the ability to concentrate, help stabilize physical performance in many cases.

In addition to strength, speed, coordination, flexibility and flexibility, endurance is one of the most important motor skills.

Endurance training is relevant to any sport. Typical endurance sports include cross-country skiing, long-distance running, cycling, triathlon, long-distance swimming and rowing.

Physical endurance is based on the supply of energy and depends on factors such as muscle size, the type of muscle contraction and the motor skills required for movement. Everyone has a certain performance limit, above which the stressed muscles can no longer provide the required performance. For this reason, endurance performance is dependent on processes that trigger muscle fatigue. In addition to the muscle fiber composition, vegetative, psychological and hormonal aspects are relevant in this context.

Function & task

Endurance in the sense of the physiological resistance to fatigue depends to a large extent on processes of energy supply. Sports medicine differentiates aerobic endurance from anaerobic endurance depending on the type of energy supply. Aerobic endurance is especially relevant for long stages and corresponds to the ability to maintain the intensity of exercise. With this requirement, the necessary energy is mainly provided by oxidation with oxygen. The specific maximum oxygen uptake is the measure of aerobic endurance.

Aerobic endurance training increases the heart muscle. The ventricular volume, the thickness of the heart muscle and the coronary arteries increase and cause the heart to expel larger amounts of blood per heartbeat. This means that there is a higher amount of oxygen available in the body, which reaches the muscles through the bloodstream and improves aerobic endurance.

Anaerobic endurance, on the other hand, is relevant for shorter intensive loads. Above a certain load intensity, the muscle is not supplied with sufficient oxygen for aerobic energy supply. So that there is still enough ATP available for muscle work, anti-oxidative processes such as glycolysis take place. As soon as the exercise stops, the oxygen deficit is compensated. The amount of oxygen responsible for anaerobic endurance can be trained.

In addition to the type of energy supply, the size of the muscles used plays a role in endurance. There is a difference in endurance between local loads and partial body loads that take up about one sixth of the skeletal muscles, such as arm work in boxing.

The type of muscle contraction also has an effect on the required endurance. In this context, a distinction is made between dynamic and static. Every type of endurance has to be viewed against the background of the respective load. It is not possible to consider one endurance species in isolation, as the individual species are directly related to one another. The general aerobic endurance occupies a key position. It forms the basis for all other types of endurance.

There is just as much a relationship as between aerobic and anaerobic endurance between types of endurance such as strength and speed endurance. In addition to the VO2max and thus oxidative processes, the muscle fiber composition, the buffer capacity, the energy supply, the respiratory muscles and the heat regulation including the water and electrolyte balance are considered performance-limiting factors. The coordinative, hormonal, vegetative, psychological and orthopedic parameters can also limit performance in relation to endurance.

Illnesses & ailments

Endurance is particularly relevant in the context of performance diagnostics. These examination and test procedures determine the current state of health, resilience and performance level of athletes. Anaerobic endurance is tested in bicycle ergometry. Similar tests are the Wingate or Katch test, which allow the patient to work at maximum speed for half an hour against greater resistance. Another test from the field of performance diagnostics is treadmill geometry. The lactate concentration in the blood is measured via lactate performance tests, which allows conclusions to be drawn about the individual anaerobic threshold of the individual. Lactate performance tests are step tests with different performance levels in chronological order and mainly determine parameters of the metabolism, such as the anaerobic threshold, the balance between lactate breakdown and lactate release. The Conconi test also determines the anaerobic threshold of the individual, but uses characteristic kinks in the heart rate.

Although performance diagnostics is primarily relevant for training planning and training monitoring within sports medicine, it can also provide information on diseases. These include above all cardiovascular diseases, i.e. diseases of the vascular system and diseases of the heart.

In this context, in addition to the Conconi test, the cardio-ergometer test and the Cooper endurance test are also relevant. With the latter, the patient completes a twelve-minute endurance run to determine endurance. The cardio-ergometer test, on the other hand, corresponds to bicycle ergometry for patients with cardiovascular damage. A specific target heart rate will stop the test and provide the doctor with results for analysis.