Effect of treadmill incline and speed on metabolic rate during exercise in thoroughbred horses.
Abstract: We examined the effect of treadmill speed and incline on O2 uptake (VO2), CO2 production, heart rate (HR), plasma lactate concentration, economy of locomotion, stride frequency, and stride length. A further aim was to examine the relationships between HR and VO2 and lactate and VO2 and whether these relationships vary with alterations in treadmill incline. The experiment was a latin square design, using five horses and five treadmill inclines (0, 2.5, 5.0, 7.5, and 10.0%). Fit Thoroughbred horses exercised for 4 min at 3 m/s at 0% slope, after which the treadmill was set to the allocated incline. Speeds tested ranged from 1 to 13 m/s. The relationships of VO2 and CO2 production with speed were curvilinear at 0 and 2.5% and linear at 5, 7.5, and 10% inclines. There was a linear relationship of HR and speed with a significant effect of incline. The plasma lactate concentration increased exponentially with speed, and there was a significant effect of incline. Stride length increased linearly and stride frequency increased in a curvilinear manner with speed but there was no effect of incline. There were linear relationships of HR with VO2 and HR with VO2 when expressed as percentage of maximum VO2 and maximum HR that were not affected by incline. The O2 cost of exercise on a 10% incline was approximately 2.5 times that for exercise on the flat. The strong relationship between the percentages of maximum HR and maximum VO2 indicates that over a wide range of exercise intensities the relative VO2 can be accurately predicted from measurements of HR.
Publication Date: 1995-09-01 PubMed ID: 8567539DOI: 10.1152/jappl.1995.79.3.951Google Scholar: Lookup
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- Journal Article
Summary
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The research looks into how the speed and incline of a treadmill affect oxygen uptake, heart rate, carbon dioxide production, blood lactate concentration, and gait parameters such as stride length and frequency in thoroughbred horses.
Experiment Design
- The study was conducted using a Latin square design, using five horses and adjusting the treadmill incline in five different stages (0, 2.5, 5.0, 7.5, and 10.0%).
- Each horse was made to workout for 4 minutes at a zero incline treadmill speed of 3 m/s. Following this, the incline was changed according to the experiment setup. The speeds observed varied from 1m/s to 13m/s.
Findings
- It was noted that VO2 (oxygen consumption) and CO2 production depicted a curvilinear relationship with speed at 0 and 2.5% inclines, while this relationship was linear at 5, 7.5, and 10% conclave changes.
- There was a linear association between heart rate and speed, influenced significantly by the incline.
- As speed increased, blood lactate levels – a marker of lactic acid build-up in the body, typically high during strenuous exercise – also increased exponentially. This too was affected by the incline.
- Stride length linearly increased with speed, and stride frequency showed a curvilinear increase as speed fastened. However, these parameters were not impacted by the incline.
- The O2 cost of exercising on a 10% incline was found to be approximately 2.5 times that of exercising on a flat surface, establishing that incline created a more challenging workout scenario for the horses.
Implications
- The researchers indicate observed linear relationships of heart rate with VO2 (at maximum VO2 and maximum heart rate), which were not affected by the level of incline, offer insights on predicting relative oxygen consumption levels from heart rate measurements.
- This has potential applications in accurately assessing and monitoring health and fitness levels in thoroughbred horses, an essential aspect in performance sports.
Cite This Article
APA
Eaton MD, Evans DL, Hodgson DR, Rose RJ.
(1995).
Effect of treadmill incline and speed on metabolic rate during exercise in thoroughbred horses.
J Appl Physiol (1985), 79(3), 951-957.
https://doi.org/10.1152/jappl.1995.79.3.951 Publication
Researcher Affiliations
- Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences, University of Sydney, NSW, Australia.
MeSH Terms
- Animals
- Exercise Test
- Heart Rate
- Horses / physiology
- Lactates / blood
- Lactic Acid
- Locomotion / physiology
- Oxygen Consumption / physiology
- Physical Conditioning, Animal / physiology
- Regression Analysis
Citations
This article has been cited 9 times.- Takahashi Y, Takahashi T, Mukai K, Ebisuda Y, Ohmura H. Effect of speed and leading or trailing limbs on surface muscle activities during canter in Thoroughbred horses. PLoS One 2023;18(5):e0286409.
- Coelho CS, Sodre TDRP, Sousa LN, Siqueira RF, Manso Filho HC, Aragona F, Fazio F. How Much Energy Vaquejada Horses Spend in a Field Simulation Test?. Animals (Basel) 2021 Nov 30;11(12).
- Self Davies ZT, Spence AJ, Wilson AM. External mechanical work in the galloping racehorse. Biol Lett 2019 Feb 28;15(2):20180709.
- Zoller JL, Cavinder CA, Sigler D, Tedeschi LO, Harlin J. Development of a mathematical model for predicting digestible energy intake to meet desired body condition parameters in exercising horses. J Anim Sci 2019 Apr 29;97(5):1945-1955.
- Wilkinson H, Thavarajah N, Codd J. The metabolic cost of walking on an incline in the Peacock (Pavo cristatus). PeerJ 2015;3:e987.
- Self ZT, Spence AJ, Wilson AM. Speed and incline during thoroughbred horse racing: racehorse speed supports a metabolic power constraint to incline running but not to decline running. J Appl Physiol (1985) 2012 Aug 15;113(4):602-7.
- Tullis A, Andrus SC. The cost of incline locomotion in ghost crabs (Ocypode quadrata) of different sizes. J Comp Physiol B 2011 Oct;181(7):873-81.
- Liedtke AM, Meijer H, Horstmann S, von Reitzenstein C, Rump I, Kirsch K. Modelling Energy Demands of Cross-Country Tests in 2-Star to 5-Star Eventing Competitions. Animals (Basel) 2025 Jun 17;15(12).
- Takahashi Y, Takahashi T, Mukai K, Ebisuda Y, Ohmura H. Changes in muscle activation with graded surfaces during canter in Thoroughbred horses on a treadmill. PLoS One 2024;19(6):e0305622.
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