Athletes training at higher than typical intensities without appropriate preparation or adequate recovery periods may become overtrained. This debilitating condition is characterised by persistent fatigue and an inability to maintain high-performance athletic outputs. Proteins and metabolites harvested from body fluids during this process can be used to monitor the state of stress and recovery when high intensity training has caused exercise-induced fatigue, stress or injury. In addition, the identification of biomarkers indicating the onset of overtraining syndrome would allow for improved monitoring and determination of key points of intervention during athletic training to prevent long-term and career threatening performance decrements.
This discovery project will utilize quantitative protein and metabolite profiling to search for novel low abundant proteins in samples sourced from a study of highly trained athletes, pre- and post-high-intensity exercise [1]. The resulting –omics based data will be integrated and analysed through a data analysis pipeline to generate a more informative view of the underlying physiology. Results generated will be compared to a control cohort that was normally trained under the same conditions.
A differential abundance of biological markers may be detectable between excessively trained and normally trained athlete cohorts. This changed biomolecule profile will be indicative of an altered physiological state based upon effected biological pathways post-overtraining and better elucidate the mechanisms that underpin the processes of post-exercise muscle fatigue.