A recent surge in research examining whether the reason we fatigue during intense and/or prolonged exercise or competition has begun to yield some interesting results. Below is a synopsis of a recent study out of England that hints that we quit because our brains, not our bodies tell us to.
While the purely physiological explanation warrants an buildup of lactic acid and depletion of muscle glycogen, other evidence may provide an additional piece to the puzzle of fatigue, or as runners often call "bonking". Matt Fitzgerald, sports performance author and regular Competitor magazine contributor writes in a recent blog post that "bonking may be in our brains". A recent study by Emma Ross is examined in Fitzgerald's article here. In a nutshell, the study found that when the brain is bypassed (i.e. thoughts of being tired) muscles could contract with little physio effects of fatigue for considerable lengths of time. It is when mental processes (which may or may not be in the athlete's present awareness) tell the muscles to contract with less force is when the effects of fatigue began to activate. From the athlete's point of view, this then becomes a feedback loop, where the athlete "feels the burn" and then begins to battle with the idea of quitting or lessening the intensity.
These findings raise many questions. First being the replicability of the study and what Ross found-if this trend of research continues, this can be huge for human performance. Others can include: What is an individual's real lactate threshold? How can we can we counter the effects mentally when fatigue begins to set in? What can we tell ourselves to combat feeling tired? Is it all in our heads?
Stay tuned on this topic, for there should be much more to come in the near future. Until then, try focusing on things other than being tired in workouts (such as a tree, spot in room, etc) or experiment with repeating a mantra to stay in rhythm.
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