Effects of manipulating volume and intensity training in masters dwimmers

Purpose: Recently, some studies have suggested that overall training intensity may be more important than training volume for improving swimming performance. However, these studies were focused on very young subjects and/or the difference between high-volume and high-intensity training was blurred. The aim of this study was to investigate in masters swimmers the effects of manipulation of training volume and intensity on performance and physiological variables. Methods: A group of 10mastersmale swimmers (age 32.3±5.1 yrs) performed two different 6-week training periods followed by a week of tapering. The first period was characterized by high training volume performed at low intensity (HvLi) whereas the second period was characterized by low training volume performed at high intensity (LvHi). Peak oxygen consumption (VO2peak) during incremental arm exercise, individual anaerobic threshold (IAT) and 100m, 400m and 2000m freestyle time performance were evaluated before (PRE) and at the end of both training periods. Results: HvLi training significant increased VOO2peak (11.9±4.9% (mean change±90%CL), P=0.002) and performance in 400m (-2.8±1.8%, P=0.002) and 2000m (-3.4±2.9%, P=0.025), with a likely change in IAT (4.9±4.7%, P>0.05). After LvHi training, speed at IAT (12.4±5.3%, P=0.004) and 100m performance (-1.2±0.8%, P=0.001) also improved, without any significant changes in VO2peak, 2000m and 400m. Conclusions: These findings indicate that in masters swimmers an increase of training volume may lead to an improvement of VO2peak and middle-long distance performance. However, a subsequent period of high-intensity low-volume training maintains previous adjustments and positively affects anaerobic threshold and short distance performance.