Human skeletal muscle mitochondrial responses to single‐leg intermittent or continuous cycle exercise training matched for absolute intensity and total work

Abstract

There is renewed interest in the potential for interval (INT) training to increase skeletal muscle mitochondrial content including whether the response differs from continuous (CONT) training. Comparisons of INT and CONT exercise are impacted by the manner in which protocols are “matched”, particularly with respect to exercise intensity, as well as inter‐individual differences in training responses. We employed single‐leg cycling to facilitate a within‐participant design and test the hypothesis that short‐term INT training would elicit a greater increase in mitochondrial content than work‐ and intensity‐matched CONT training. Ten young healthy adults (five males and five females) completed 12 training sessions over 4 weeks with each leg. Legs were randomly assigned to complete either 30 min of CONT exercise at a challenging sustainable workload (~50% single‐leg peak power output; Wpeak) or INT exercise that involved 10 × 3‐min bouts at the same absolute workload. INT bouts were interspersed with 1 min of recovery at 10% Wpeak and each CONT session ended with 10 min at 10% Wpeak. Absolute and mean intensity, total training time, and volume were thus matched between legs but the pattern of exercise differed. Contrary to our hypothesis, biomarkers of mitochondrial content including citrate synthase maximal activity, mitochondrial protein content and subsarcolemmal mitochondrial volume increased after CONT (p < 0.05) but not INT training. Both training modes increased single‐leg Wpeak (p < 0.01) and time to exhaustion at 70% of single‐leg Wpeak (p < 0.01). In a work‐ and intensity‐matched comparison, short‐term CONT training increased skeletal muscle mitochondrial content whereas INT training did not.

Insights into the development of insulin resistance: Unraveling the interaction of physical inactivity, lipid metabolism and mitochondrial biology

“…However there remains considerable debate regarding the efficacy of this training program given that a majority of research in this area quantifies acute metabolic responses to HIIT compared with volume-matched lower-intensity endurance exercise, which out of necessity is short in duration and less frequent. However, a recent report utilizing a single-leg, 4-week training program to compare endurance and HIIT adaptations within an individual suggests endurance training elicits greater mitochondrial biogenesis ( Skelly et al, 2023 ), and when not volume matched, endurance exercise also appears to be favorable for improvements in VO 2 max and post-prandial lipid tolerance when compared to SIT ( Petrick et al, 2021 ). This is in line with the earlier finding that a single bout of endurance exercise prevents impairments in insulin sensitivity following an 18 h lipid infusion ( Schenk et al, 2005 ).…”