Identificação das características fisiológicas e das terminologias utilizadas em estudos com ciclistas e corredores: uma proposta de classificação em relação ao status de treinamento

Abstract

Sample recruitment in sport sciences studies could be a limiting factor, once it is difficult for professional or elite athletes to broke their routines in order to undergone experiments. For this reason, the studies usually recruit volunteers who do not fit this scope, which can generate some mistakes regarding the terminologies for description training status of volunteers. Although there are some proposals for training status classification, we still find a misuse of terms in the studies. In this context, there should be a criterion well established by the authors to describe the training status of volunteers in relation to physiological characteristics and terminology. Therefore, the present study aims at identifying terminologies for status classification and its relation fitness level reported in studies on cycling and running since the year 2000. The study was divided into two phases: first, a search was conducted in the PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus databases where 589 studies with cyclists and 414 studies with runners were selected. As a result, we found 34 and 23 terminologies associated with the training status of cyclists and runners. Relative V̇ O2máx was the most reported physiological variable being present in 61.80% of studies with cyclists and 61.11% of studies with runners. A large number of terminologies for volunteers with very close or identical relative V̇ O2max values was found (34 for cyclists and 23 for runners). Based on a non-consensus result, and aiming at elaborating a more concise and concordant classification model regarding the description of the training status, in the second phase we proposed an ordering of V̇ O2max values from the lowest to the highest value, separated into quintiles. A Delphi Consensus methodology was carried out in which experts in sport sciences were invited to opine trying to reach a consensus about which terminologies would best characterize the relative levels of V̇ O2max of cyclists and runners. In the first phase, a questionnaire was prepared through Google Forms® where experts should choose the terminologies that would best represent the relative V̇ O2máx levels of cyclists and runners. The five terms that obtained the highest frequencies of responses would pass to the second phase. Then, experts had to choose between the five terms from the first phase, those that best represented the relative levels of V̇ O2max. For some V̇ O2max levels only one term was a consensus while for others 2-3 terms were suggested. In conclusion, we proposed a concise classification for training status of cyclists and runners that could contribute to reduce the confusion of interpretation and facilitates the description and characterization of the samples in future studies in these modalities.