Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Semester of Degree Completion

1979

Thesis Director

M. Thomas Woodall

Abstract

It was the purpose of this study to investigate the relationship of oxygen debt and blood pH change during the recovery from exercise.

For this study, ten male members of the Eastern Illinois University track team were chosen as subjects on the basis of their levels of physical condition.

The subjects were tested on three different occasions. The first test for all subjects was a fifteen minute resting oxygen consumption. Then depending upon random selection, the subjects ran on a treadmill and on another test day rode a bicycle ergometer, or vice versa. Preceding each exercise a pre-exercise micro-blood sample was taken. The subject then performed the exercise to the point of perceived exhaustion. He then breathed into a Tissot tank for a fifteen minute recovery period, and then by analysis of the expired air, the subject's oxygen debt was determined. Three minutes after the completion of the exercise a post-exercise micro-blood sample was taken. The pre- and post-exercise blood samples were analyzed on a pH meter.

The rank-difference correlation was used to find the interrelationship between oxygen debts and blood pH changes, following the treadmill run and bicycle ergometer ride.

The t-test was used to find the significance of the difference between means for the pre- and post-exercise oxygen debts and blood pH changes, for both exercise modes.

The investigation revealed no relationship between the size of the oxygen debt and the blood pH change in the recovery from exercise. Nor was there a difference in oxygen debt incurred and blood pH change obtained on the treadmill and the bicycle ergometer. Both modes of exercise were equally effective in developing oxygen debts and in causing blood pH levels to decrease.

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