The Impact of COVID-19 on the Preparation for the Tokyo Olympics: A Comprehensive Performance Assessment of Top Swimmers.
Int J Environ Res Public Health
; 18(18)2021 09 16.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1409529
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
The Olympic preparation of athletes has been highly influenced by COVID and post-COVID syndrome. As the complex screening of athletes is essential for safe and successful sports, we aimed to repeat the 2019-year sports cardiology screening of the Olympic Swim Team before the Olympics and to compare the results of COVID and non-COVID athletes.METHODS:
Patient history, electrocardiogram, laboratory tests, body composition analysis, echocardiography, cardiopulmonary exercise test (CPET) were performed. We used time-ranking points to compare swimming performance.RESULTS:
From April 2019, we examined 46 elite swimmers (24 ± 4 years). Fourteen swimmers had COVID infection; all cases were mild. During CPET there was no difference in the performance of COVID (male VO2 max 55 ± 4 vs. 56.5 ± 5 mL/kg/min, p = 0.53; female VO2 max 54.6 ± 4 vs. 56 ± 5.5 mL/kg/min, p = 0.86) vs. non-COVID athletes (male VO2 max 56.7 ± 5 vs. 55.5 ± 4.5 mL/kg/min, p = 0.50; female 49.6 ± 3 vs. 50.7 ± 2.6 mL/kg/min, p = 0.47) between 2019 and 2021. When comparing the time results of the National Championships, 54.8% of the athletes showed an improvement (p = 0.75).CONCLUSIONS:
COVID infection with short-term detraining did not affect the performance of well-trained swimmers. According to our results, the COVID pandemic did not impair the effectiveness of the preparation for the Tokyo Olympics.Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
COVID-19
Type of study:
Experimental Studies
/
Prognostic study
Topics:
Long Covid
Limits:
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
Country/Region as subject:
Asia
Language:
English
Year:
2021
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Ijerph18189770
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