Are You Overtraining? Two Scientifically Proven Methods to Test Yourself - Method 2: ABEL Sport Test. Plus: 54 Item Questionnaire + 8 Additional Clues to Identify Overtraining

Theoretically it's already available for everyone. Costs are yet not the only thing you should keep in mind before you buy into Knight Scientific's overtraining analysis system

I've got plenty of positive, skeptic and euphoric feedback in response to last week's first installment of this two-part series on "proven" methods to test for overtraining syndrome (OTS). Before I tackle method number two in today's second installment, I do thus want to briefly remind you that the HRV method is not going to work, when you are chronically overtrained, already. It's also questionable, whether it will be able to identify parasympathetic overtraining syndrome (POTS). The latter is associated with marked decreases, not increases in the ratio of high / low frequency component (Portier. 2001). In people who train intense and with a high volume this effect can even mask the early increase in sympathetic tone and would thus render the HRV method basically useless.

You can learn more about overtraining at the SuppVersity

Heart Rate Variablity (HRV)

ABEL Sports Test + More

Overtraining & Undereating

Calculate your Energy Intake!

There Are No Magic Macros!

Reinvent Your Training!

More alternative tests / indicators of overtraining:

• increased sensitivity of 5HT receptors ➯ early fatigue (Budgett. 2010)
• free testosterone and testosterone/cortisol ratio higher than 30% (Cunha. 2006)
• increasing serum urea and decreased ammonia at rest w/ identical protein intake, indicative of higher gluconeogenesis from protein (Urhausen. 2002)
• low urinary catecholamines, esp. during night and w/ parasympathetic overtraining (Lehmann. 1992) and low ACTH and/or GH response to maximal exercise (~adrenal fatique; cf. Urhausen. 2002)
• inverse ‘iceberg profile’ in Profile of Mood State (POMS) scale (Morgan. 1987) and messed up sleep (Urhausen. 1998)
• decreased glucose & increased fat oxidation during high intensity exercise (Urhausen. 2002)

None of these markers can serve as a sole marker of overtraining. They can however support conclusions you make based on questionnaires, performance data and HRV analyses.

For method number two, so-called ABEL-Sport Test, these interferences between symathetic (~intensity, short(er) term) and parasympathetic (~volume, long(er) term) overtraining shouldn't be a problem. The test is easy, but it's not free. You will after all have to buy a portable luminometer to measure the optical properties of your blog. In other words, the ...

"[...] test does not measure a single biomarker of OTS [overtraining syndrome] but instead utilises hidden information acquired by circulating leucocytes as they patrol the body spotting pathogens, responding to markers of inflammation (cytokines and chemokines) and other changes in the blood that occur after strenuous exercise." (Knight. 2013)

As J Knight, M Wakeman, J Reeves, who have a vested interest in research into their own products, which have been used by elite and amateur athletes in many different fields and were "successfully used" by Skandia Team GB for two years prior to and in the final run up to the Olympics in Beijing in 2008, when Britain’s squad topped the medal table in the Olympic sailing competition, point out, the test is designed to elicit this "hidden information from the cells" (and I should add "hidden information that requires interpretation"!).

The technology relies on the bioluminescent protein Pholasin. It emits light, when it gets in contact with reactive oxygen specimen (ROS). To test the amount of leucocytes in a 5-20µL sample your blood you do thus just have to react it with Pholasin, activate the ROS response of the leukocytes and measure the light response (Roberts. 1985, 1987; Knight. 1999). By superimposing the results on a set of reference sample curve, Knight et al. are then (that's at least the claim) able to identify various responses during training, "indicating if the athlete is heading towards OTS and identifying infections, superimposed on training curves." (Knight. 2013)

With score way beyond 25 (15 is the first signal of OT), it's usually a good idea to take some time off and re-start your training at a saner intensity / volume - irrespective of ABEL or HRV results.

Stay skeptic! Despite the fact that a very similar technology has already been used in the analyses of the effects of foods and cosmetics, there is as of yet no independent comparison of the accuracy of the interpretation of the leukocyte ROS responsible on which Knight et al. base their assessments of the training status.

The word "interpretation" should have made you sit up: Even if the scientists are able to provide a cost-effective solution for individual hobby athletes, it is not guaranteed that the results are actually going to help you control your training load. Before the beneficial real-world effects Knight et al. observed in sailors, footballers and other athletes are confirmed in a well-controlled study by an independent team of researchers, I would thus suggest you rely on the traditional rules of thumb, your personal training experience, the HRV method and the overtraining questionnaire on the right of this "bottom line".

References:

• Budgett, R., Hiscock, N., Arida, R., & Castell, L. M. (2010). The effects of the 5-HT2C agonist m-chlorophenylpiperazine on elite athletes with unexplained underperformance syndrome (overtraining). British journal of sports medicine, 44(4), 280-283. 
• Cunha, G. D. S., Ribeiro, J. L., & Oliveira, A. R. D. (2006). Overtraining: theories, diagnosis and markers. Revista Brasileira de Medicina do Esporte, 12(5), 297-302.
• Knight, J. (1999). Rapid, simple and sensitive blood biocompatibility tests with the light emitting protein Pholasin®. Proceedings of the TechMed/Medical Device Technology Conference. Advanstar Communications UK Ltd, Chester, 3-17.  
• Knight, J., Wakeman, M., & Reeves, J. (2013). Abel-Sport™ Test For Assessing Over Training Syndrome And Detecting Infection. British journal of sports medicine, 47(17), e4-e4.
• Lehmann, M., Gastmann, U., Petersen, K. G., Bachl, N., Seidel, A., Khalaf, A. N., ... & Keul, J. (1992). Training-overtraining: performance, and hormone levels, after a defined increase in training volume versus intensity in experienced middle-and long-distance runners. British journal of sports medicine, 26(4), 233-242.
• Morgan, W. P., Brown, D. R., Raglin, J. S., O'connor, P. J., & Ellickson, K. A. (1987). Psychological monitoring of overtraining and staleness. British Journal of Sports Medicine, 21(3), 107-114.
• Portier H, Louisy F, Laude D, Berthelot M, Guézennec CY (2001). Intense endurance training on heart rate and blood pressure variability in runners. Medicine and science in sports and exercise, 33(7), 1120-1125.
• Roberts, P. A., Knight, J., & Campbell, A. K. (1985). Pholasin®: a new bioluminescent indicator for cell activation. Biochem. Soc. Trans. 1140, 1139-1140. 
• Roberts, P. A., Knight, J., & Campbell, A. K. (1987). Pholasin®: a bioluminescent indicator for detecting activation of single neutrophils. Anal. Biochem. 160, 139-148.
• Urhausen, A., Gabriel, H. H. W., Weiler, B., & Kindermann, W. (1998). Ergometric and psychological findings during overtraining: a long-term follow-up study in endurance athletes. International journal of sports medicine, 19(2), 114-120.
• Urhausen, A., & Kindermann, W. (2002). Diagnosis of overtraining. Sports medicine, 32(2), 95-102.

Are You Overtraining? Two Scientifically Proven Methods to Test Yourself - Method 1: Heart Rate Variability Analyses

It may sound like the invention of the heart rate monitor industry, but it's a matter of scientific "fact" that HRV analyses are a great tool to monitor and manage training and recovery.

Overtraining, its existence, consequences and detection is and has always been one of the hottest topics in the fitness community. While some practitioners and trainers claim that it does not even exist, others fear it so much that they constantly undertrain. The result? Stagnation.

In the highly competitive world of the average iron-willed gymrat, it's however pretty rare that the gains ain't coming, 'cause he or she is under-training. I would guesstimate that the exact opposite is the case for at least 75% of the self-proclaimed hard-gainers. Overtraining, undereating and/or  a lack of consistency are the stumbling blocks of 99% of the trainees.

I know that you know all that, ...

... so I'll cut this short and get right to the point. Within the past two weeks I hit upon two interesting papers that describe very different, but - in both cases - effective methods to determine whether you are overtraining, or not. While I originally wanted to tackle both in one article, I had to realize that the day has only 24h for my to write and you to read SuppVersity articles. Therefore, I decided to tackle heart rate variability monitoring today and postpone writing about the other to next week's follow up (stay tuned!).

You can learn more about overtraining at the SuppVersity

Heart Rate Variability

ABEL Test

Overtraining & Undereating

Calculate your Energy Intake!

There Are No Magic Macros!

Reinvent Your Training!

I guess you may have heard about the usefulness of the latter on my buddy Carl Lanore's Super Human Radio, already and are thus familiar with the idea that your heart’s ability to produce fluctuations in the beat-to-beat interval in response to different situations. According to José Morales and his colleagues from the Laboratory of Sport Sciences a the Ramon Llull University in Spain,

Don't turn into the guy on the left, don't overtrain & undereat | learn more

"the use of heart rate variability (HRV) as a training tool has progressively increased and deserves attention as a tool to monitor the possible states of overtraining and recovery after a training process. [...] Several studies suggest that the quantification of HRV can be used as a non-invasive method for assessing autonomic  cardiovascular  control  via  the  impact  of  HRV  on  beat-to-beat  heart  rate  modifications." (Morales. 2013)

The relationship between autonomic modulation and HRV is different during exercise and immediate recovery compared to rest periods. This makes the HRV a viable tool for the non-invasive assessment of the autonomic cardiovascular control and a comparatively objective measure of your training status (Camm. 1996; Seiler. 2007; Bosquet. 2008) .

Hold on: What exactly is my HRV? Actually it's much less complicated than terms like fourier-transforms and frequency domain suggest. If you say "my heart rate is 60 beats per minute", this is an average you measured over a certain timespan. If you counted every beat for 60s, for example, the iterval between the beats probably was not exactly 1s. One beat may have been "premature", another took a little more than one second to finally come. The HRV is a measure for the variation in the time interval between heartbeats. In other words, if your heart beats 60 times per minute 24/7, your HRV would be zero and you're probably a cyborg ;-)

The HRV responds particularly to heavy loads / intense workouts. The magnitude of the workout-induced stress is thought to be proportional to the activation of the sympathetic arm of the autonomic nervous system and thus the variations in autonomic balance, which can be indirectly assessed using HRV analysis (Seiler. 2007). A significantly lowered HRV days after a heavy workout is thus a signal that your central nervous system is still recovering. It tells you that you'd better insert a light cardio day or spend the time with friends instead of getting back onto the grind for another torturous 5x5 session.

Technology vs. psyche - HRV vs. RESTQ-Sport

Compared to psychological tests like the Recovery Questionnaire for Athletes (RESTQ-Sport), which is frequently used in research to observe the balance between stress and recovery during training processes, the physiological data you evaluate with the HRV method is obviously more objective. It is yet still debated whether it is also reliable and can / should replace or complement the classic psychological testing procedures.

Table 1: Overview of the training weeks of the two groups (Morales. 2013)

For Morales and his colleagues this doubt was among the most important reasons to conduct a study that would integrate both methodologies. To this ends, the researchers recruited 14 male national-standard judo players (age 22.85 years; height 174.08 cm; body mass 76.85 kg) and randomized them to four-weeks of...

• high training load (HTL - 8 sessions per week ➙ short recovery periods)
• moderate training load (MTL - 4 sessions per week ➙ long recovery periods) 

For the detection of the HRV at the beginning of the first and last session in weeks 1 and 4, the researchers used a Polar S810 cardiotachometer which provided the scientists with the following parameters either directly or the corresponding data to calculate them:

Figure 1: A wide spread (green ellipse) of the poincare plot indicates full recovery.

• the mean inter-beat (RR) interval,
• the standard deviation of the inter-beat (RR) interval , 
• the heart rate & its standard deviation
• the square root of the mean squared difference of successive RR intervals, 
• the number of consecutive RRs that differed by more than 5 ms each, and 
• the percentage of consecutive RRs that differed by more than 5 ms each

That sounds extremely complicated, but in the day and age of automated data acquisition and immediate processing (including fourier transformation to get the frequency data, etc.), there are lot of tiny little gadgets and apps that can do all the hard math-work for us.

HRV + RESTQ-SPORT + HTL vs. MTL = reliable training analysis

The next thing they did was to to simply plot pairs of inter-beat intervals, e.g. 1/60 vs. 1/64, 1/64 vs. 1/76, etc. the resulting graph is a so-called poincare plot (see Figure 1) and the spread of the point in this graph can tell you whether you are well-rested (wide ellipse) or overtrained / need rest (narrow ellipse)

Figure 2: Changes in selected HRV variables, left; performance, as well as stress + recovery values in the RESTQ-Sport, right; all differences expressed relative to values at the beginning to study (Morales. 2013)

The data in Figure 2 (left) does yet demonstrate - the poincare plot of the inter-beat variables characterizes the decreased heart rate variability (HRV) quite well.

"The multivariate test indicated that there was an interaction effect between the testing time and group on HRV variables. [...] the HTL group showed lower square root of the mean squared difference for successive RR intervals, very low frequency, high frequency, short-term variability and short-range scaling exponent in the post-test than in the pre-test (p < 0.05). The HTL group showed higher low/high frequency ratio in the post-test than in the pre-test. Finally, there were no differences between the pre-test and post-test in the MTL group." (Morales. 2013)

In other words: While the HTL group showed the expected increase in HRV, the judo players in the MTL group did not experience any significant changes in heart rate variability.

The question that remains - at least until you take a look at the data in Figure 2 (right) - is: Do these abstract figures really tell me that I am overtraining? The answer the comparison to the data from the RESTQ-Sport questionnaire gives us is YES, it does!

Don't be that guy or girl who works his / her ass off for nothing. Learn how to identify and combat the Athlete's Triad | read all articles.

Bottom Line: The accumulating scientific evidence and the ever-increasing number of practitioners (trainers and trainees) who rely on heart rate variability analyses to judge whether or not they are over-training clearly suggest that a heart rate monitor and the appropriate software (usually part of the bundle) would make a valuable addition to any (over-)ambitious athlete's Christmas gift list.

If there is still room for another present on your wishlist, I'd suggest you come back next week for part II of this series, to learn about another, maybe sexier method to find out whether your perception that training 1h-2h with no sweat every day won't have you overtrain (note: not sweating or feeling cold in the gym can be signs of severe or chronic overtraining).

Reference:

• Bosquet, L, et al. "Is heart rate a convenient tool to monitor over-reaching? A systematic review of the literature." British journal of sports medicine 42.9 (2008): 709-714.
• Camm, A. J., et al. "Heart rate variability: standards of measurement, physiological interpretation and clinical use. Task Force of the European Society of Cardiology and the North American Society of Pacing and Electrophysiology." Circulation 93.5 (1996): 1043-1065.
• Morales, J., Álamo, J. M., García-Massó, X., López, J. L., Serra-Añó, P., & González, L. M. (2013). The Use Of Heart Rate Variability In Monitoring Stress And Recovery In Judo Athletes. Journal of strength and conditioning research/National Strength & Conditioning Association. 
• Seiler, Stephen, Olav Haugen, and Erin Kuffel. "Autonomic recovery after exercise in trained athletes: intensity and duration effects." Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise 39.8 (2007): 1366.  

Acoustic Gear: An Overview of the Ergogenic Effects of Music + Things to Keep in Mind, When Compiling a Playlist

Breakdance is not the only, but probably the most obvious example of the perfect synergy of "exercise" and beats per minute.

Today's SuppVersity article is one of those pieces which grew organically and in fact, it was Primalkid aka Alex, who shot me a mini "True of False" item on the music and it's effect on exercise performance, a couple of days ago and thus planted the idea to revisit the effects of music on exercise performance in my brain. While Alex' mini-item was concise and to the point (see blue box towards the bottom of this article), I did remember that I had read about the ergogenic effects of music several times in the past, so I told him, I would expand his "True or False" piece "somewhat", before posting it... well, nerdy as I am, one study came to the another and I ended up with way too much information for a single "True or False" item.

The SuppVersity Soundtrack of your Workout

Instead of simply telling you that the right music can have a beneficial impact on your workouts, I have thus decided to provide you with a brief overview of more or less randomly selected studies to give you an idea of what would make a good addition to your next MP3 purchase.

• The bad news first: As beneficial as it may be for the average trainee, the pro and everyone who needs to focus can also be distracted by an upbeat workout soundtrack (Brownley. 1995). Everyone who has ever participated in any type of competition will know that: Races, matches etc. if you don't zone in 100% on what you are doing, you lose... and if you will, that's exactly what the 1995 study from the Department of Psychology at the University of North Carolina I deliberately picked to kick this summary off, confirms.
  
  
  

  Picking the right music the easy way: In this day and age, you are probably not surprised that a group of researchers over at the Philips Research Center in Eindhoven and the Vrije Universieit in Amsterdam (both in the Netherlands) have already come up with a gadget that's going to do the job for you. The IM4Sports music system consists of a portable player with in-ear phones, heart rate sensor belt, acceleration sensors and a personal computer that will automatically select the "best" music to match your workout (Wijnalda. 2005).
  
  Data on the real world performance increases that can be achieve by using the prototype the Dutch scientists developed is yet unfortunately not available - the same applies (at least to my knowledge) for the commercial availability of a similarly sophisticated device, although the current generation of mobile phones would actually only be hooked up to a bluetooth heart rate sensor to get the job done.
  In a series of standardized submaximal cycle tests, Kimberly A. Brownley and her colleagues exposed 8 trained and 8 untrained runners to "no", "sedative" (commercially marketed stress management seletion), and "fast" (selection from pop, rock and movie soundtracks) music and measured heart rate, blood pressure, skin temperature, rating of perceived exertion, cortisol release, respiration, general feeling (ranging from “very bad” to “very good”, corresponding to -5 to +5) and time to exhaustion of their participants.

  "Repeated measures ANOVA revealed increased respiratory frequency during fast music as compared to the no music and sedative music conditions (p < 0.01). Plasma cortisol levels did not differ at baseline across the music conditions; however, following high intensity exercise, higher cortisol levels were associated with fast music as compared to no music and sedative music (music X intensity interaction, p < 0.01) [...] there was a music x group x intensity interaction (p < 0.05) in which untrained subjects reported more positive affect compared to trained subjects while listening to fast music during low and high intensity exercise. Data collected at voluntary exhaustion revealed significantly more positive affect and higher skin temperature (p values < 0.01) in untrained compared to trained subjects." (my emphases in Brownley. 1995)

  While it is debatable whether the increase in cortisol in response to the fast music has to be considered an advantage or disadvantage (learn why), the statistically significant positive effect of the fast music on the affect of the untrained subjects (+1.6 vs. -0.1 in the trained subjects) during both low and high intensity exercise, suggest that untrained individuals benefit to a greater extend from taking their iPods to the gym than the pros, who may even be distracted by the music, lose focus and thus feel annoyed by listening to fast music.
  
  The latter is also supported by a slightly more pronounced but statistically non-significant increase in time to exhaustion that's not mentioned in the scientists' summary of the results quoted above.

  ---

  Bottom line: For trained athletes exercise performance is not only limited by physical, but also by mental factors, the same music that energizes his untrained peers can therefore be annoying for the better trained athlete.

• Rocky and/or Top Gun are the "top dogs" among the workout soundtracks - both before / and during HIT (Yamamoto. 2003). There is a reason "The Eye of the Tiger" always hits bullseye (stupid pun intended). It's the 52% increase in plasma epinephrine that sets you into fight an flight mode, when you listen to Rocky's anthem before your next PR.
  
  

  

  It may not be ergogenic, but it is unquestionably motivating: The Anthem from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's 1976 master piece "Rocky" (photo © 1976 MGM)

  Ok, ok, ... I have to admit a 52% increase is just what the researchers from the Nagoya University measured in their six healthy university students (24.0 ± 4.1 years, 172.2 ± 2.6 cm, 70.2 ± 5.4 kg and 23.7 ± 0.7 kg/m) after listening to the soundtrack for 20min and right before a supramaximal cycle ergometer test. The exact effect size will probably be different for you, but the principle remains the same.
  
  If we know assume that the general trend holds in the case of the power output as well, this would unfortunately mean that you won't get any actual performance increments out of it. After all, in the study at hand, neither the slow (Chopin) nor the fast music had any measurable effects on the mean power output during, or the blood lactate, ammonia or plasma catecholamine levels following the exercise.

  ---

  Bottom line: Despite existing physiological effects (catecholamine release), the Rocky and/or Top Gun soundtracks are obviously rather psycho- than physiostimulants. The latter could obviously entail motivational benefits, which could come handy on those days you don't really feel like adhering to your workout schedule.

• 

  If you are interested in a couple of tips on designing the optimal HIIT vs. MIIL routine, check out the SuppVersity HIIT-Series

  Medium intensity interval listening can be a superior alternative to a constant stream of music (Beckett. 1990). I guess I will first have to explain what "medium intensity interval listening" (MIIL) is, before I get to the actual benefits this way of listening to your favorite music only intermittently can have on your exercise performance.
  
  The principle is actually quite straight forward. Just as you would jog for 5 min and walk for another 5 min on a medium intensity interval training protocol, you simply pick your favorite radio station / playlist, listen to it for 5 min and then continue training for another 5 min without music.
  
  If you work anywhere similar to the 32 students (age 18-22) who particpated in Amy Beckett's 1990 study, the above protocol can increase the distance you'll cover during 30 min of walking by 43%/14% (women) or 38%/29% (men) compared to not listening to music at all (first figure) or a steady stream of pop/rap/rock/techno or whatever music you prefer (second figure).

  ---

  Bottom line: Maybe you remember what I wrote about the inflation of "True or False" posts here at the SuppVersity a couple of days ago? How they would lose their appeal if I kept bombarding you with daily TOF items!? Well, I guess it's the same for the music - the on/off scheme avoids that the beneficial effects wear off.

• Earplugs can be ergogenic - at least, if you train in gym where they play music you don't like (Nakamura. 2010). Why? Well according to a 2010 study from the São Paulo State University having to listen to music you don't like can have downright ergolytic effects. That's at least what  the scientists observed in their subjects, when they cycled at critical power while listening to "non-preferred" music.
  
  

  

  Don't hesitate and wear ear-plugs during a spinning class, when you feel that the music hampers your performance (learn more about HIIT vs. LISS, DHT and fat loss & more). 

  Compared to the trial in the course of which the 15 subjects listened to their preferred music, the participants of the Nakamura study covered a 28% lower distance and still felt significantly more fatigued, when they had to listen to Justin Bieber.(the "non-preffered music is not specified, but I thought this would be a good example ;-).
  
  As long as you can tolerate the music in your gym, it does yet appear as if it does not really matter, if you're training with fast upbeat music, classical music or self-selected music in the background. At least that's what the results of a previous study from the University of Kansas would suggest.
  
  In the said study by Potteigner et al., "[e]ach type of music resulted in a reduced peripheral, central, and overall RPE" (Potteigner. 2000) during 20 minutes of cycling at 70% of the VO2max, when compared with a no-music condition.

  ---

  Bottom line: As the results of the Nakamura study shows, your ear-plugs can also have "anti-ergolytic" (=anti performance decreasing) effects in certain environments. Another reason to have your MP3 player fully charged all the time?!

Let's be honest, guys. These days you really don't have to be ashamed if you wear earplugs or headphones in the gym - regardless of your age.

• The general usefulness of music does not depend on age (Becker. 1994). In view of the fact that you see relatively few pensioners walking along the street with the earplugs of their iPods in their auditory canals, it may sound surprising, but research shows: Children, adults and seniors all benefit from listening to music before a short (2min) exercise trial.
  
  Moreover, neither the type of the music mellow vs. frenetic, nor  the baseline activity levels and thus physical fitness of the participants influenced the beneficial effects on mileage in the study from the Ursinus College in Collegeville.

  ---

  Bottom line: Let's be honest, 10 years ago, age may have been a reason to refuse running around with an MP3 player in the gym, but these days it certainly isn't. So, if you want to be extraordinary and distinguish yourself from your sedentary, increasingly obese, pre-diabetic age-mates and do something for your health and overall fitness, simply follow the example of your grandchildren: Get yourself an MP3 player.

• 

  If you recall Sunday's installment of "True or False", you will be aware that things work differently if you perform the music yourself. For the drummers in the De La Rue study, for example the heart rate peaks (186bpm were much higher than the average beats per minutes of the songs they were playing (learn more)

  Music tempo and heart rate / exercise intensity should be in sync (Karageorghis. 2006;  2011)  The results of the 2006 and 2011 studies by Karageorghis et al. indicate that "preference for fast tempo increased, relative to medium and very fast tempo music, as exercise intensity increased" (Karageorghis. 2011).
  
  In view of the fact that it appears as if a close match between the heart rate and the beats-per-minute was the confounding factor here, it is not really surprising that the slow music condition with <80bpm was depreciated by all subjects in the two studies from the Brunel University in London. 80bpms is after all roughly identical to the target heart rate during the low intensity exercise trial (40% HRmax) in the study and way below the target heart rates during the medium and high intensity conditions.

  ---

  Watch out, the BPM <> HR connection is not linear: As sensible as it may be to matching the bpm of your workout songs to your heart rate, the relationship is not clearly linear (see figure from Karegeorgis 2012). Rather than that, the optimal bpm increases from >120bpm for low intensity exercises to <140bpm for high intensity exercise in the 80% HRMax range, when the heart rate of the young study participants would be in the >160bpm range, already.

• If you are in sync with the music this will optimize your movement patterns (various) In the jargon the innate human predisposition to synchronise movement with musical rhythms is called "rhythm response".
  
  
  There is more, for example the study Alex' covered in hit True Or False: "According to researchers at the Department of Kinesiology, California State University, self-selected music increased squat jump explosiveness and feelings of vigor, tension, and reduced fatigue (Biagini. 2012). Of course the 20 college age athletes also performed bench press reps to failure with no difference between the music and silence groups, suggesting that music may enhance acute power performance but not multiple-set strength training. So next time you sprint, bring some headphones and a good song ;-)"
  According to Karageorghis it has been studied "since the turn of the twentieth century" and refers to the "commonalities between movement frequency during exercise and music tempo" of which Schneider et al. have been able to show in 2010 that it is reflected by the frequency (approximately 3 Hz) of electroencephalographic delta activity in the brain:
  

  "Results of this study give reason to speculate that a strong relationship exists between intrinsic and extrinsic oscillation patterns during exercise. A frequency of approximately 3 Hz seems to be dominant in different physiological systems and seems to be rated as pleasurable when choosing the appropriate music for exercising. This is in line with previous research showing that an adequate choice of music during exercise enhances performance output and mood." (Schneider. 2010).

  Now those 3hz = 3 beats per second translate to 180 beats per minute and are thus slightly above the previously discussed upper limit of the optimal BPM scale.
  
  More recent fMRI studies by Kornysheva et al. have broadened our understanding of the underlying mechanisms and led to the conclusion that activity in the ventral premotor cortex, which links motor and cognitive function, is enhanced when we are working out to music within the optimal BPM margin. According to the German researchers their results confirm the notion that ...
  

  "[...] the premotor activity increase during preferred tempo is the result of enhanced sensorimotor simulation of the beat frequency. This may serve as a mechanism that facilitates the tuning-in to the beat of appealing music." (Kornysheva. 2010)

  Most intriguingly, previous reports by Roerdink et al. (2008) suggested that the synchronous use of music may also reduce the metabolic cost of exercise by promoting greater neuromuscular or metabolic efficiency - an observation that would stand in line with a theory by Smoll & Schultz, who speculated in 1982 that a regular kinaesthetic pattern may require less energy to replicate owing to the absence of minute adjustments within the kinetic pattern, while offering a greater relaxation which comes from the precise expectancy of the forthcoming movement (Smoll. 1982).

The examples I compiled in the previous paragraphs are certainly not all-encompassing, but by now you should actually have a basic understanding of the different levels at which music can effect your performance and psychological well-being / motivation while you work out. The emphasis on positive results may however evoke the unwarranted impression that you'd just have to bring your iPod to the gym if you wanted to set one PR after the other. That's however not the case. As the first item on the list already suggested,

"[...] music is a beneficial accompaniment to exercise in most circumstances,  [but] it is contraindicated under certain conditions: (a) when it may distract users from safety-relevant information (e.g., on public roads); (b) when exercisers need to focus their full attention on learning a demanding motor skill (e.g., a power clean); and (c) when exercising at high intensities that require an associative attentional style (i.e., ‘listening to the body’)." (Karageorghis. 2012)

There is also more than just a handful of studies where neither fast, nor slow beats had any, or at least no significant impact on the exercise performance of the study participants (e.g. Schwartz. 1990; Pujol. 1999). 

No bottom line, but factors to keep in mind when you're setting up your playlist

Regardless of the fact that music is probably not going to be the solution to all your performance and motivation problems in the gym and elsewhere, it is still absolutely worth experimenting with your iPod or whatever other device you use to listen to music before, during and maybe even after  your workouts (the latter to calm down and kickstart recovery) and the following list of things to keep in mind may help you with your N=1 experiments.

What makes a song "workout compatible"? According to Costas Karageorghis, an associate professor of sport psychology at Brunel University in England, who created the Brunel Music Rating Inventory, the most important determinant of the "workout compatibility" of a song is its tempo, which should be between 120 and 140 beats per minute.

This applies to a wide range of commercial dance music, and many rock songs and it corresponds roughly to the average person's heart rate during a medium intensity workout. Karageorghis mentions "Push It" by Salt-N-Pepa and "Drop It Like It's Hot" by Snoop Dogg, but also the dance remix of "Umbrella" by Rihanna as examples that would make a good addition to a playlist you would listen to during a cardio session. For a high-intensity workout like a hard run, he suggested Glenn Frey's "The Heat Is On."

Personal preference is yet also important: According to a NY Times article (Kurutz. 2008), Haile Gebrselassie, the Olympian from Ethiopia, for example, often requested that the techno song "Scatman," which has a BPM of around 135, be played over the sound system during his races.

The same article cites Flex senior writer Shawn Prine who says: "The vast majority of bodybuilders are fans of heavy metal, if not in their personal life at least in the gym". Perine believes that it "keeps you elevated, especially in between sets", but personally prefers to work out listening to hip-hop songs.

In the end, it is thus probably a combination of the compatibility of the M-BPM and H-BPM (music and heart beats per minute), the rhythmicity of the music and the type of exercise and - of course - your personal prefercenes that makes a song "workout compatible".

personal characteristics / preferences & coherence

• obvious confounding factors are age and socio-cultural upbringing of the individual
• the lyrics can increase motivation even if respective references to exercise, performance, power etc. are only indirect
• beat matching, style matching, artist matching, era matching, etc. is important in terms of formulating a cohesive music mix
• the coherence of the playlist increases if you pick pieces from the same era, the same genre, or by the same artist when moving between the pre-, in-, and post-task phases (Terry. 2011)

exercise environment / demographics (with groups)

• en vogue pop songs have been shown to be specifically motivational for the "average trainee"
• in group exercise classes, where music is used synchronously, it appears that the rhythmic abilities of participants warrant careful consideration in the sequencing of music selections (De nora. 2000)
• concerting the workout program with the music can be highly beneficial; e.g. a change or absence of music can be an effective marker of the next exercise phase or unit, such as the progression from a cardiovascular segment to a warm-down phase

desired outcomes (e.g. performance, relaxation, etc.)

•  > 120 bpm for stimulation
• < 80bpm for sedation
• 60–70 bpm (around resting heart rate) for post workout recovery
• the inclusion of natural sounds, such as breaking waves, bird song or a babbling brook, may benefit recovery, as well (Karageorghis. 2012)

exercise intensity / heart rate / movement pattern

• it is advantageous for the rhythm of the music to approximate the motor patterns of the workout (Crust. 2008; Schneider. 2010)
• as a result of segments that involve syncopation or span musical measures certain parts of a song can provoke increased synchronicity and thus improved motor coordination independently of the baseline rhythm (Styns. 2007)

In view of the fact that it has been shown that no "motivational" music programme designed by someone else can ever match the efficiacy of a self-selected and constantly revised playlist (Karageorghis. 2012), you will probably understand that I will leave it with that and won't provide you with something like an "official SuppVersity Workout Soundtrack"... trust me, you will find what works for you if you incorporate some of the principles you've learned about in this article.


References:

• Becker N, Brett S, Chambliss C, Crowers K, Haring P, Marsh C, Montemayor R. Mellow and frenetic antecedent music during athletic performance of children, adults, and seniors. Percept Mot Skills. 1994 Oct;79(2):1043-6.  
• Brownley KA, McMurray RG, Hackney AC. Effects of music on physiological and affective responses to graded treadmill exercise in trained and untrained runners. Int J Psychophysiol. 1995 Apr;19(3):193-201. 
• Crust L. Perceived importance of components of asynchronous music during circuit training. J Sports Sci. 2008 Dec;26(14):1547-55. 
• DeNora T. Music in everyday life. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press; 2000. 
• Karageorghis CI, Jones L, Low DC. Relationship between exercise heart rate and music tempo preference. Res Q Exerc Sport. 2006 Jun;77(2):240-50.
• Karageorghis CI, Jones L, Priest DL, Akers RI, Clarke A, Perry JM, Reddick BT, Bishop DT, Lim HB. Revisiting the relationship between exercise heart rate and music tempo preference. Res Q Exerc Sport. 2011 Jun;82(2):274-84.
• Karageorghis CI, Priest DL. Music in the exercise domain: a review and synthesis (Part I & II). Int Rev Sport Exerc Psychol. 2012 Mar;5(1):44-84.
• Kornysheva K, von Cramon DY, Jacobsen T, Schubotz RI. Tuning-in to the beat: Aesthetic appreciation of musical rhythms correlates with a premotor activity boost. Hum Brain Mapp. 2010 Jan;31(1):48-64. 
• Kurutz S. Choosing the best music for exercise. NY Times - Healthscience. January 10, 2008.
• Nakamura PM, Pereira G, Papini CB, Nakamura FY, Kokubun E. Effects of preferred and nonpreferred music on continuous cycling exercise performance. Percept Mot Skills. 2010 Feb;110(1):257-64.
• Potteiger JA, Schroeder JM, Goff KL. Influence of music on ratings of perceived exertion during 20 minutes of moderate intensity exercise. Percept Mot Skills. 2000 Dec;91(3 Pt 1):848-54.
• Pujol TJ, Langenfeld ME. Influence of music on Wingate Anaerobic Test performance. Percept Mot Skills. 1999 Feb;88(1):292-6.#
• Roerdink M. Anchoring: Moving from theory to therapy. Amsterdam: IFKB; 2008.  
• Ryan RM, Deci EL. Self-determination theory and the facilitation of intrinsic motivation, social development, and well-being. Am Psychol. 2000 Jan;55(1):68-78. 
• Schneider S, Askew CD, Abel T, Strüder HK. Exercise, music, and the brain: is there a central pattern generator? J Sports Sci. 2010 Oct;28(12):1337-43.  
• Smoll F.L., Schultz R.W. Accuracy of motor behaviour in response to preferred and nonpreferred tempos. Journal of Human Movement Studies. 1982;8:123–138.
• Schwartz SE, Fernhall B, Plowman SA. Effects of Music on Exercise Performance . Journal of Cardiopulmonary Rehabilitation. September 1990.
• Styns F., van Noorden L., Moelants D., Leman M. Walking on music. Human Movement Science. 2007;26:769–785.  
• Terry P.C., Karageorghis C.I. Music in sport and exercise. In: Morris T., Terry P.C., editors. The new sport and exercise psychology companion. Morgantown, WV: Fitness Information Technology; 2011. pp. 359–380.
• Wijnalda G, Pauws S, Vignoli F, Stuckenschmidt H. A Personalized Music System for Motivation in Sport Performance. Pervasive Computing. July–Sep 2005.

OxyElite, Jack3D and PowerFULL - USPLabs' "Own" Studies Find: The Products Are Safe and OxyElite Does Even Work!

Image 1: When the sales of the "crown jewels" in their line-up is at stake, even the average supp company CEO becomes interested in "science"

You know that I am a huge fan of supplement companies spending some of your (the customers) hard earned money on actual research. The latest "science offensive" from USPLabs, however, has a negative connotation. I mean, you should expect that you establish that your product is safe before you throw it onto the market, right? Be that as it may, the way USP is currently under attack by the FDA and Johnny Pacheco, whose motifs for filing a class action suit against USPLabs are somewhat nebulous (cf. armytimes.com), is still overblown and the petty controversy about whether DMAA aka "geranium" is or is not a natural constituent of geranium oil puts me off big time... so let's stop gossiping and take a look at the latest data from the USPLabs at the University of Memphis ;-)

"We have got three products here, make sure they are safe and effective!"

I guess, when the whole issue about the "false claims" about 1,3-dimethylamylamine (aka geranium) boiled up, someone in the USPLabs head quarter in Dallas must have had the glorious idea that his, or I should say, the company's money would be better invested in some research to refute at least those claims pertinent to the possible adverse health effects of USPLabs mega-sellers Jack3D and OxyElite Pro than in yet another Ferrari for the CEO. The results of this glorious idea have recently been published in the journal Nutrition and Metabolic Insights and, assuming that USP did not get a bulk discount, must have cost them 5x $1699 for the publication, only...

Figure 1: Summary of study design and main findings of the five recently published studies on Jack3D (Whitehead. 2012; Farney. 2012), OxyElite Pro (McCarthy. 2012a; McCarthy. 2012b) and Powerfull (Alleman. 2011)

I have summarized the study design, as well as the main results, of which I do believe that they are reliable, despite being "sponsored" and despite being published in a "pay and have your articles published in 3-weeks"-journal, in figure 1. The main message here is obvious: The "geranium" containing products are safe!  The problem with this message is yet, that ephedra is just as safe, when it is consumed in reasonable doses and by healthy, young and athletic people. Whenever something is touted as a fat burner, you do yet get people like the obese diabetic who is supposed to have died after taking a dozen of the "good old" Super Caps (30mg ephedrine) along with a few cans of coke in his "effort" to lose weight.

As safe as a weapon - in the hands of the right person ;(

In this context it is also quite telling that the subjects in the acute OxyElite study were advised to take only a single cap, while the recommendation on the label says that a "regular" serving would be two caps. By selecting the right subjects (lean, healthy, young, athletic) and using a "minimal dosing approach" the scientists thusly produced the results USP needs to present them in court, where they will be having a hard time, anywas. After all, a recent study by Lisi et. al. apparently confirms that...

[...] geranium oils do not contain methylhexaneamine and that products labelled as containing geranium oil but which contain methylhexaneamine can only arise from the addition of synthetic material (Lisi. 2011)

With respect to the "natural" claim, USP thus appears to be on the losing side, it will therefore be all the more important for them to refute the claim that their "unnatural" product is (on top of being unnatural *outrageous* ;-) also bad for your health.


The products "work", but without making a noticeable difference

And despite the fact that the other study results pertaining to the effectiveness of the products are going to be of little value in court, I suspect that you will be interested to hear that all three products, i.e. Jack3d, OxyElite Pro and PowerFULL do "work" - the extend to which they do so is however either not statistically significant or very unlikely to come up to what USP is making their customers believe the products would do.

Image 2: Jack3D is a powerful stimulant, but chronic intake will rather burn you out than increase your gains.

Note: It should be said that none of the studies investigated the effects on training performance. This is relevant, because I personally believe that for the "supplement naive" subjects in the study, the caffeine + geranamine rush from Jack3D would definitely have made a difference on an acute basis. With regard to the chronic effects of pre-workout products, we do yet all know that their contribution to both strength and muscle gains is meager and has been scientifically validated only for products which contain relatively large amounts of BCAAs - something Jack3D, which is not much more than a beta alanine laden stimulant cannot boast of.

The meager +27kcal (total) increase in resting energy expenditure in the 2h after the ingestion of a single capsule of OxyElite, for example, is about as useless as the pronounced increase in free fatty acids (+100%) and glycerol (+44%) in the same trial as long as you don't get your ass off the couch and "exercise the fat away" - in the worst case, the decreased insulin tolerance that comes with the increase in catecholamines in response to the ingestion of the caffeine + geranamine + yohimbine containing supplement will have people who take the word "fat burner" too literally stash away even more fat, when they pop their 2 caps of OxyElite in the morning, benefit from the statistically like-wise non-significant appetite suppressant effect of the product, to fast all day long and then go on a rampant binge in the evening.

Figure 2: Changes in appetite, dietary intake in kcal, total fat free and fat mass, trunk fat (measured by DEXA) and skinfold thickness after an 8-week intervention (regular exercise was maintained and the subjects voluntarily reduced their energy intake) with either OxyElite Pro or placebo (data calculated based on McCarthy. 2012b)

The data from the 8-week trial on the OxyElite Pro (McCarthy. 2012b), I plotted in figure 2 does yet show that the addition of a "fat liberator" like OxyElite or any other stimulant based self-proclaimed "fat burner", can actually help you shed body fat, if you combine it with a reasonable reduction in energy intake (~20% in the study at hand) and exercise (5.2 ±0.3 hours/week in the study at hand).

OxyElite Pro is a reasonable addition to diet + exercise, but PowerFULL?

Image 3: Duong at the beginning and end of his impressive12-week transformations I've seen in quite some time (click here to read more)!

And, by the way, if you want to support USPLabs' fight against the FDA and a group of notorious litigators, you better buy another bottle of OxyElite and a container of Jack3D, before spending a single buck on the false hope that the transient and highly individual (more than 40x difference between subjects; Alleman. 2011) increase in GH, Alleman (French for "the German" ;-) and his colleagues observed after the ingestion of one serving of PowerFULL would increase anything, but USPLabs non-DMAA dependent income.

Apropos, with methylhexaneamine (DMAA), as chemists sometimes refer to it, being banned in Europe as of now, everyone here in the EU who wants to give either Jack3D or OxyElite Pro a shot, to see similar results as Duong (cf. image 3), who used the latter during his awesome transformation, should better hurry. The products will disappear from the market, as soon as the retailers have sold their last stock.

Acoustic Gear: The Right Music at the Right Time Can Double your Endorphin and Growth Hormone Levels, Increase Norepinephrine By +50% Over Baseline and Make You Feel Like the King of the Gym...

Image 1: Attention reading SuppVersity
posts and following respective advice may
have desirable ergogenic (side-)effects ;-)

Does your life rock? No? Did your last gym session suck? Yes? Well, maybe you just don't inject the right gear into your auricle (ear). We all know that listening to music can profoundly influence the way we feel. In the course of the last 20 years scientists from all around the world have been investigating how these musically triggered emotional changes relate to hormonal, neurocrine and even immunological changes and mechanisms and have found, time and again, that music "provides the simplest solution" for symptoms such as pain and hyperactivity, in the treatment of which, "[t]oday, an emphasis has been placed on pharmacological substances" (Gangrade. 2011).

Even the idea to substitute your stimulant-loaden preworkout supplement with a full dose of techno music is thus not as outrageous as it may occur to you, at first sight. Particularly in view of the cardiac effects (heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, cf. figure 1) of a single inter-auricular injection of 30 minutes of 1000 beats per minutes soundtracks from Cyber Trip, Techno Shock & Techno Magnetiko at a peak sound intensity of 70 dB 16 healthy 18- to 19-year-old received in a 1998 study by Gerra et al. (Gerra. 1998) would easily outperform the Jacked3Ds, SuperPumps and NoXPlode's from your local GNC.

Figure 1: Effect of 30 minutes of techno and classical music on heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressure (data adapted from Gerra. 1998)

Have I gotten your attention, no? Well, what if I told you that the same techno beats also doubled the beta-endorphine and growth hormone concentrations of the subjects and increased your favorite 'lift-and-pump-catecholamine' noripenephrine by a whopping 50% (cf. figure 2)?

Figure 2: Relative (to baseline) neurotransmitter, catecholamine and hormone response to 30 minutes of techo vs. 30 minutes of classical music (data adapted from Gerra. 1998)

I see, now you're listening. A pros pos listening, did I mention that a hefty dose of H.W. Wenze or Ravi Shankar could possibly return the training-induced elevations of cortisol and noradrenaline back to baseline (Gangrade. 2011) and thus improve / accelerate regeneration. If you are a Japanese women, a proper way to further augment exercise recuperation would be to listen to some Japanese children's folk songs sung in English by Susan Osborn in order to ramp up your testosterone by ~20%, if you are a man, you would probably be better off with Ozzy or another Osborn, as the Japanese children's folk songs decreased the testosterone levels of male subjects in a 2003 study by Fukui & Yamashita (Fukui. 2003) by at least >12%!

As far as the immediate effects on exercise performance are concerned, it is interesting to note that Brownley, et al. (Brownley. 1995) in a 1995 study found that trained and untrained athletes react very differently to music with different tempos. In their conclusion the authors claim that

[c]ollectively these  results  suggest  listening  to  fast,  upbeat  music  during  exercise  may  be  beneficial for  untrained  runners  but  counterproductive  for  trained  runners.

If you feel beat up and don't want to go to the gym today, I suggest you you immediately get your daily dose of intra-auricular Tiger eyes by clicking on the YouTube video above;-)

While this statement is in line with the subjective exertion the subjects reported after about half an hour on the treadmill, it is slightly incorrect, if you judge the athletic performance by the time to exhaustion, which was maximal, in both groups, under the 'fast music' condition (fast  music  included  contemporary  pop,  rock,  and  movie  sound track  selections  standardized  within  a  tempo range  of  154-162  beats/min).

And although scientists still argue whether the emotional changes trigger the endocrine responses or vice versa, I would suggest you get your iPod ready, select your favorite catecholaminergic techno songs for your workout and download a handful of the anti-catabolic Classics to consume them with your post-workout protein shake ;-)