ABSTRACT
In adults, changes in cardiac structure and function after aerobic training are well documented[1-4], with different adaptations occurring in endurance vs power athletes[4, 5], In children, far less information is available. Studies have shown that the cardiovascular systems of prepubertal children can adapt to aerobic training but the mechanisms (central and/or peripheral), responsible for these functional adaptations are not well established[6-8]. In particular, little is known about the influence of aerobic training during prepuberty on cardiac structure and function and conflicting results have been reported[6, 9-14]. In addition, previous studies did not involve a great deal of anaerobic training. In a recent longitudinal study[15], we reported specific physiological adaptations (i.e. increase in https://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> V ˙ O 2 https://s3-euw1-ap-pe-df-pch-content-public-p.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/9781315025001/ca0a1b50-16e7-4532-9e85-fe2cd38f2327/content/inline-eqn700_B.tif" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"/> max) in a group of prepubertal swimmers after a 1 y intensive training programme when compared to a control group. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the cardiac structure and function in this group of highly-trained swimmers. The same analysis was also applied to prepubertal gymnasts in order to evaluate the effect of aerobic vs anaerobic training.
