Abstract
Overtraining syndrome is caused by prolonged excessive training and insufficient regeneration in active athlete, and can adversely affect an athlete's performance. It manifests itself with both physiological and psychological symptoms that persist even after the two weeks of rest.
The evidence indicates an incidence rate of ~ 20-30%in young athletes. Our knowledge of the overtraining syndrome is lacking.
The therapy is usually prolonged, based on several weeks or months rest. 16 years old elite basketball player, indicated for spiroergometry due to repeated detection of high blood pressure. Graded exercise test was performed at the Department of Sports Medicine, Motol University Hospital in May 2010, in the end of the sporting season, following nearly 3 weeks of rest.
Patient complained of sleep disturbances, increased perspiration and total fatigue lasting several weeks. Despite of intensive motivation of the athlete for maximal performance he finished test untimely due to lower extremities muscle fatigue with HR 175 beats per minute, RQ 0.96 and VO2peak 48.4 ml/min/kg.
State of health was interpreted as the overtraining syndrome. Second examination was performed in the 3rd Department of Medicine, General University Hospital in Prague, January 2011, during the first half of the sporting season.
The athlete didn't complained of any problems. He finished graded exercise test for total exhaustion with RQ 1.13, VO2max 64.0 ml/min/kg, with the similar protocol of examination as in May 2010.
Subjective afflictions and objective finding during graded exercise test illustrate that the training volume aforementioned concurrently with lack of regeneration is extreme and so unsuitable for young growing organism. In the second examination, performed eight months later, we found out lower rest HR, favourable blood pressure reaction to dynamic work, 31% increase in VO2max and increase in RQ from 0.96 to 1.13.
Even the two examinations were performed in different departments, we think that so evident differences in VO2max and RQ cannot be interpreted just by the particular type of an analyzer. The main point of this case history is to highlight young elite athletes overloading.
Too intensive training of young athletes originates in permanently increasing demands on performance in all sports branch.