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Relationship between ventilatory function and age in master athletes and a sedentary reference population

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Abstract

Ageing is accompanied with a decline in respiratory function. It is hypothesised that this may be attenuated by high physical activity levels. We performed spirometry in master athletes (71 women; 84 men; 35–86 years) and sedentary people (39 women; 45 men; 24–82 years), and calculated the predicted lung age (PLA). The negative associations of age with forced expiratory volume in 1 s (FEV1; 34 mL·year−1) and other ventilatory parameters were similar in controls and master athletes. FEV1pred was 9 % higher (P < 0.005) and PLA 15 % lower (P = 0.013) in athletes than controls. There were no significant differences between endurance and power athletes and sedentary people in maximal inspiratory and expiratory pressure. Neither age-graded performance nor weekly training hours were significantly related to lung age. Life-long exercise does not appear to attenuate the age-related decrease in ventilatory function. The better respiratory function in master athletes than age-matched sedentary people might be due to self-selection and attrition bias.

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Acknowledgments

We appreciate the financial support from Stratec Company (Pforzheim, Germany) to perform oxygen diffusion measurements. We appreciate the support by Kurt Kaschke, Dieter Massin, Winston Thomas and Bridget Cushen as representatives from WMA, EVAA and BMAF. We are grateful to the participants—without their contribution this study would not have been possible.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Biomedical Research into Human Movement and Health, Manchester Metropolitan University, John Dalton Building; Chester Street, Manchester, M1 5GD, UK

    Hans Degens, Thomas Mark Maden-Wilkinson, Alex Ireland, Jamie S. McPhee & Jörn Rittweger

  2. Division Space Physiology, Institute of Aerospace Medicine, German Aerospace Center, Cologne, Germany

    Hans Degens & Jörn Rittweger

  3. Department of Health Sciences, University of Jyväskylä, Jyväskylä, Finland

    Marko T. Korhonen, Harri Suominen & Ari Heinonen

  4. Research Institute of Sport Science, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary

    Zsolt Radak

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  1. Hans Degens
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  2. Thomas Mark Maden-Wilkinson
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  3. Alex Ireland
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  4. Marko T. Korhonen
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  5. Harri Suominen
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  6. Ari Heinonen
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  7. Zsolt Radak
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  8. Jamie S. McPhee
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  9. Jörn Rittweger
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Correspondence to Hans Degens.

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Degens, H., Maden-Wilkinson, T.M., Ireland, A. et al. Relationship between ventilatory function and age in master athletes and a sedentary reference population. AGE 35, 1007–1015 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11357-012-9409-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11357-012-9409-7

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