The Effect of External Intervention on Time to Exhaustion and Recovery after Continuous Exercise in Male Athletes

The aim of this research was to study the effect of external intervention on recovery and time to exhaustion after continuous exercise in male athletes. In this study, 10 healthy male athletes (mean age and standard deviation 21.6±2.60 years, height 177±4.26 cm and weight 73.1±5.72 kg) volunteered to participate in this study. All participants performed two equal stages of endurance training under two different experimental conditions: without listening to any music and listening to the moderate tempo music (130 bpm). The subjects were asked to select one of the pieces of music before the experiment and they performed the exercise with and without music after 5 minutes of warm-up. Participants continued exercise with 60, 70 and 80% of maximum heart rate. The heart rate was evaluated at the end of each stage and exactly after the recovery. The training protocol continued with the intensity of the last stage until exhaustion. An interval of 72 hours was considered between the stages. At the recovery stage, after training with the intensity of 60 and 70% of maximum heart rate, there was no significant difference in the reduction of heart rate between the two groups (P>0.05). However, at the third stage of recovery, heart rate significantly reduced under the condition of listening to the music (P<0.05). Time to exhaustion increased significantly during exercise under the condition of listening to moderate tempo music (P<0.05). The findings of this study suggested that music influenced the recovery only after high intensity exercises. On the other hand, endurance training can improve with external intervention (music). Finally, moderate tempo music may have significant effects on the performance during high intensity endurance training.