European Journal of

Eur J Appl Physiol (1985) 53:312--316

Applied
Physiology
and Occupational Physiology
9 Springer-Verlag 1985

Energy sources in alpine skiing (giant slalom)*

F. Saibene, G. Cortili, P. Gavazzi, and P. Magistri
Centro Studi di Fisiologia del Lavoro Muscolare, C.N.R., Milan, Italy and Dipartimento di Scienze e Tecnologie Biomediche,
University of Milan, Italy

Summary. The energy cost of a giant slalom event representative of the energy cost of the whole
was measured in eight sk!ers of national level. The lap exercise. Moreover, the exercise is often reprodu-
lasted on average 82 s. Vo2 was measured during the cible on a special ergometer (treadmill, bicycle,
first, the second and the last third of the lap in flume) and the measurements are easily obtained for
different trials and also during recovery from a a large number of subjects. In this way a standard
complete lap. Blood lactate was measured at the end value of the energy cost of a particular sport can be
of a lap. From the data obtained it was possible to defined for a given speed.
calculate that: a) Vo2, as measured during the lap, On the contrary, there are other sporting activi-
would correspond at steady state to 80% of the ties whose duration is of only few minutes, even
(/o ....... of the subjects; b) the total metabolic power seconds, involving movements which are not very
delivered during the lap should be equal to about repetitive and not easily reproducible in laboratory
72 ml 0 2 9 kg - 1 . min -1, corresponding to 120% of conditions. The energy demand of such exercise
Vo ...... of the subjects. Considering the short dura- cannot be fulfilled by the aerobic yield alone, since
tion of the trial and the power output delivered the energy request is higher than the maximum
during maximal efforts on a bicycle ergometer, it aerobic power, and/or the duration of the event is not
appears that the giant slalom is not a very high energy long enough to attain a steady state. For these
demanding event 9 reasons the energy cost of these events has been little
Key words: Aerobic exercise - Anaerobic exercise - studied. Alpine skiing is usually classified among the
Energy sources - Alpine skiing anaerobic events (Tesh et al. 1978), in fact even
downhill, the longest trial is never longer than 3 min;
it is difficult, however, to known the contribution of
the energy sources to the overall energy expenditure.
In an attempt to establish: a) the energy cost and
Introduction b) the aerobic and anaerobic power developed in
alpine skiing, we made a series of experiments during
Most of the studies published so far on the energy cost a simulated giant slalom competition, a speciality
of a sport deal with so-called repetitive aerobic which shares the characteristics of both downhill and
events. These are characterized by exercises lasting special slalom. From measurements of oxygen up-
more than 5 rain, and in some cases more than 1 h, take, oxygen debt, and lactic acid production it
whose energy requirement is below the maximum appeared that the aerobic and the anaerobic sources,
aerobic power of the subject. In this situation a steady at least for the giant slalom, share the same
state is easily attained and, since the exercise consists contribution to the energy cost of a run and that the
of a series of repetitive movements,the measurement overall energy request is about 20% higher than the
of oxygen uptake over a short period of time is maximum oxygen uptake, l)o .... .

* Preliminary results of this work have been presented at the

XXII. World Congress on Sport Medicine, Vienna 1982
Methods
Offprint requests to: F. Saibene, M.D. Centro Studi di Fisiologia
del Lavoro Muscolare, C.N.R. via Mangiagalli, 3 2 - 1-20133 A field laboratory was set up the base of a giant slalom track
Milano, Italy (1,100 m length, 300 m gradient, 41 poles) on the Col Ch6crouit,
F. Saibene et al.: Energy sources in alpine skiing (giant slalom) 313

Courmayeur, Aosta Valley (1,700 m a.s.1. ; Pb = 618 mm Hg). The the data collected can be considered to be at least a
profile of the track was traced by an expert of the Italian Ski good indicator of what happens during any other
Federation (FISI) according to the international requirements on
giant slalom event.
the basis of an average racing difficulty. Throughout all the
experiments the snow conditions were fairly constant, and in any The physical characteristics of the subjects,
case the snow was never frosty. The subjects were eight athletes of together with their 1)'o...... are reported in Table 1.
the Ski Team of the Scuola Militare Alpina of Courmayeur, all of The average VO2 " ' S of each subject, measured during
them of national level. During the experiment the subjects wore a the three sections of the run are reported in Table 2.
special helmet holding a mouthpiece with a stopcock manually
operated which allowed the subject to expire either externally or
In the same table are also reported: a) the time of
into a bag for the collection of expired air. The bag was tightly fixed beginning of collection of the expired air, to; b) the
at the back of the skier with elastic straps. A small capacity bag mean duration of air collection for each fraction of
(30 1) was used and this had the important advantage that it allowed the run, Ec; c) the mean mid time relative to the 1)o2 of
the skier to move as freely as possib!~e. Conversely, a larger bag for
each fraction, which was calculated as the time from
collecting air throughout the lap would have hindered the
movements around the poles and offered a substantial resistance to the start to the beginning of the air collection minus
the air. The expired air was collected over a known, preselected, half the duration of the air collection, ff; d) the mean
section of the lap and the duration of collection was measured with duration of the complete lap,/1. In Fig 1 the average
a stopwatch which was turned on and off while opening and closing Vo2, for all subjects, measured during the three
the valve to the bag. Three expired air collections were performed,
for the first, the second, and the last third of the lap. This allowed a sections of the lap, is plotted against the time of the
study of the kinetics of 1)o2 during the lap. 12o2 was also measured lap. Despite the fact that the profile of the track
during recovery. The skier, after arrival, sat on a chair on the snow, (length, slope, and number of poles of each fraction)
a threeway stopcock was fitted to the mouthpiece and air was was not perfectly even, it appears t h a t 1)O2 increases
collected in the same way as described by di Prampero et al. (1976).
rather smoothly, as an exponential function of time.
Transition from arrival to sitting required on average 7.5 s. The
duration of the air collection was 15 s for the 1st min, 30 s for the By means of a nonlinear regression it was possible to
2nd min, and 60 s for the 3rd min. The volume of the air collection fit an exponential function of the type: 1)o2t =
in the bags, while skiing or resting, was measured by emptying the Vo;ss. (1-e -kt) (Katch 1973), where 1)o2SS, repres-
bag through a dry gas meter (Collins). The composition of the enting the value of Vo2 at steady state should the
expired air was analyzed by means of a carbon dioxide meter
(Leibhold) and an oxygen meter (Taylor) frequently calibrated exercise continue for a longer time, was obtained by
using gas mixtures whose composition had been previously iterative procedure. Vo2ss was equal to about 48 ml
determined in the laboratory. After 5 min from the end of a Q . k g - ~ . m i n -1, corresponding to 80% of 12o........
complete iap, a sample of venous blood was collected for the average for all subjects (see Table 1). The integral
determination of lactic acid concentration, which was performed
time of this curve, i.e., the area described by the
with a standard enzymatic procedure (Gerken 1960). Two or three
determinations of Vo; were made on the same subject for each of dotted curve line and the abscissa in Fig. 1, represents
the three sections of the lap, and two determinations during the total O 2 consumed, in ml 9 kg -1, during the lap: it
recovery. In addition, two lactic acid concentrations were deter- amounts to 48.3 ml 02" kg -t. Subtracing the O2
mined for each subject at the end of a lap. Within 2 weeks from the consumed for the resting metabolism for the duration
field experiments the subjects came Io the laboratory (210 m a.s.l.)
for determination of I)o~,,,:.. Subsequently, 1;~o~was also measured
of the lap, the net value is 41.5 ml 02 - kg -1.
every 15 s, for 90 s, with the same technique used in the field Lactic acid concentration in mmol-1-1, the
experiments, during efforts, from 60 to 130% of the individual duration of the lap, L lactic acid production (as the
' O 2,,, , , . peak value measured at the end of the lap minus the
resting value, divided by 0 are reported in Table 3.
The mean value of lactic acid concentration at the end
Results and discussion of the lap was 6.8 + 0.9 SD mmol 9 1-t, while direct
measurements of blood lactate on 10 athletes after an
The limitation of a method based on field measure- international ski race show an average lactate pro-
ments results mainly from the difficulty of reproduc- duction of 9.0 m m o l . 1-1. No correlation was found
ting the same experimental conditions from day to between lactic acid concentration and the duration of
day. Moreover, in the case of a slalom event, there is the run.
no track equal to another from place to place, and The gross alactic 02 debt, calculated from the
also in the same place the snow conditions may integral of the fast pay-off component of the Vo2
change considerably within few hours. Therefore, recovery curve (Roberts and Morton 1978), was
when considering the energy cost of a giant slalom equal to 25.3 + 2.5 SD ml O2" kg -1.
event, this is mainly specific to the particular track The other problem arising from these experi-
were the energy cost has been measured. However, ments is due to the fact that part of the energy
since the profile of the track used in the present expended during the exercise is derived from an-
experiment and the average time of the run were aerobic metabolism. In order to calculate the total
considered fairly representative of a typical slalom energy expenditure, in 02 equivalent, one has to
track, according to the skiers and to the instructors, known: a) the gross alactic 02 debt, i.e., the amount
314 F. Saibene et al.: Energy sources in alpine skiing (giant slalom)

Table 1. Anthropometric characteristics and maximum aerobic power of the subjects

Subject Age Height Weight !)'o..... P'o .....

(years) (cm) (kg) (l. rain -~) (ml. kg -1 9 min -i)

C.H. 21 168 64 3.916 61

A.G. 19 172 65 3.965 61
V.G 9 20 180 69 4.347 63
M.C. 19 178 72 4.320 60
P.R. 19 162 62 3.472 56
P.A. 19 170 67 3.886 58
T.B. 20 165 61 3.721 61
A.F. 20 175 76 4.513 59
19.6 171.2 67.0 4.018 58.9
SD 0.74 6.25 5.13 0.351 2.17

Table 2. VO2 m e a s u r e m e n t s during the three sections of the lap

Subject I II III

[0 fc If V02 [0 ~'c If V02 [0 ~ Vo2 fl

(s) (s) (s) (ml. kg - i . (s) (s) (s) ( m l - k g -1- (s) (s) (S) (ml. kg -1. (s)
min 1) min-J) min -1)

C.H. - - - - 29.9 19.0 39.4 41.0 63.3 19.4 73.0 43.7 82.7
A.G. 0 30.4 15.2 23.7 28.7 23.4 40.4 39.2 55.8 24.0 67.8 45.6 79.8
V.G. 0 30.3 15.2 27.2 28.1 22.4 39.3 42.7 47.7 31.3 63.4 43.9 79.0
M.C. 0 30.8 15.4 20.9 29.1 22.2 40.2 36.8 64.2 11.7 70.1 46.1 76.0
P.R. 0 28.7 14.4 26.3 27.8 22.5 39.1 40.0 61.2 20.9 71.7 42.0 82.1
P.A. 0 28.9 14.5 26.9 28.3 19.5 38.1 36.9 65.5 19.4 75.2 43.2 84.9
T.B. 0 30.1 15.1 26.9 29.5 19.9 39.5 41.3 62.0 21.2 72.6 42.9 83.2
A.F. - - - - 29.8 20.7 40.2 42.8 64.0 20.8 74.4 43.2 84.8
0 29.9 15.0 25.3 28.9 21.2 39.5 40.1 60.5 21.1 71.0 43.8 81.6
SD 0 0.86 0.41 2.52 0.80 1.63 0.75 2.34 5.95 5.43 3.87 1.38 3.08

f0: beginning of collection of the expired air,

fc: mean duration of collection of the expired air,
ff: mid time of 12o2 measurement, defined as t-2~+t0
fi: mean duration of a complete lap.
All figures are averages of two or three measurements

Vo2 60 Table 3. Net lactate concentrations A La, net lactate production

ml Oa per unit time AL~ and mean time of a complete tap. All figures are
kg mln 50 averages of two measurements

40 Subject A La A La t
(mmol. l -i) (retool- 1-1 9 rain l) (s)
30
C.H. 8.3 6.0 82.7
A.G. 6.] 4.6 79.8
20
V.G. 7.1 5.4 79.0
M.C. 6.2 4.9 76.0
10 P.R. 6.6 4.8 82.1
P.A. 6.8 4.8 84.9
_ I
% 110 210 310 40 510 6JO 70 80 90 T.B. 8.0 5.8 83.2
t (s) A.F. 5.8 4.1 84.8
6.8 5.t 81.6
Fig. 1, Average Vo2 for all subjects during the three sections of the SD 0.90 0.64 3.08
lap vs the time of downhill (means _+ SD)
F. Saibene et al.: Energy sources in alpine skiing (giant slalom) 315

of 0 2 calculated from the fast component in the increased without a concomitant maximal utilization
decline of oxygen consumed during recovery from of aerobic transport capacity.
exercise and b) the energy equivalent of lactate In the giant slalom, and generally speaking in
accumulation in blood at the end of exercise. While most of the skiing events, the lactic contribution can
the so called slow component of the 0 2 recovery also be in part increased by the relative hypoxia met
curve has been often questioned as truly represen- by the skiers, since the races take place mostly at high
tative of the energy resynthesis of glycogen from altitude (Pb = 610 mm Hg in these experiments).
lactic acid, the fast component is generally accepted Gladden and Welch (1978) measured the contribu-
as representing the sum of the amount of energy tion of the aerobic and the anaerobic sources during
derived from PC splitting and of the amount of 02 supramaximal efforts lasting 2rain, on a bicycle
derived from the body stores (Astrand and Rodhal ergometer, at 120% of l)'o...... of their subjects.
1977; Roberts and Morton 1978; Cerretelli et al. During the experiments the subjects inspired gas
1972). As far as lactate accumulation at the end of the mixtures with different 0 2 fractions. From the data
exercise is concerned, its energy equivalent has been presented it is possible to calculate that the lactic
taken to equal 3.2ml O 2 . k g - l . m m o l -~ as, on contribution is 21% at sea level and 24% at an
average, it turns out in experiments on running inspired O a partial pressure equivalent to that met by
(Margaria et al. 1971), cycling (Gladden and Welch the subjects of the present experiment at
1978) and swimming (di Prampero et al. 1978). 1700-2000m a.s.1., and increase of about 15%.
The sum of the net 0 2 uptake, gross alactic debt From the results of Gladden and Welch it appears
contracted and the 02 equivalent of the lactic acid that: a) as with skiing, exercising on bicycle ergo-
produced during the run is equal to 89.4 ml 02" kg -1. meter at 120% 12o...... implies a significant contri-
The aerobic sources represent 46.4% of the total bution of lactic sources, presumably owing to the
energy yield, while the lactic and alactic energy degree of isometric contractions performed; b)
sources share the remainder almost equally, 25.3% despite the fact that the total energy request is higher
and 28.3% respectively. The power delivered during than I)o........ the 02 request is not maximal and c) in
a trial lasting about 80s was equal to 72ml supramaximal exercise in hypoxic conditions lactic
0 2 9 kg - l - min -1, corresponding to 120% of the metabolism is slightly increased.
average Vo...... of the six subjects (see Table 1) or On the contrary, during the experiment perform-
something more if one takes into account the lactate ed in the laboratory on the treadmill it was observed
concentration measured after a real race. that in a supramaxial exercise (corresponding at
On the basis of the results obtained, this event, steady state to 120% of 1)'o...... and lasting 80 s) the
although supramaximal, cannot be considered total 0 2 uptake measured at the mouth, is greater
exhaustive. In fact, according to Dawson and Wilkie than that measured on the ski track. In Fig. 2 the time
(1977) a maximal effort leading to exhaustion in 80 s course of the 17o2'S measured when skiing, and when
corresponds to about 175% of I2o2o,.~.In exhaustive running on the treadmill at similar intensity is
exercise, as the time of exhaustion increases the total
energy output decreases, but the contribution of the
aerobic sources increases: in such conditions at a total 8 0 i ~ i i i r i

energy request of 120% of I)o ...... the exercise can 120

rc
last 4 - 5 rain and the aerobic contribution represents "~:
r~, E
about 80% of the total energy yield. As already
O~ I ~ ::>0
mentioned and illustrated in Fig. 1, 0 2 uptake during , .- g
these experiments increases almost exponentially 80
towards a final value of 48ml O . . kg -~- rain -~
40
corresponding to about 80% of I2o2,~,,. The aerobic
contribution is then reduced for two reasons: a) the
exercise is too short and b) the 02 request is not 40
maximal.
Eriksson et al. (1978) claimed that during a giant
slalom race the demand on the circulatory system
should be maximal or nearly maximal, but the in- OI I ~ i I [ = i ~ 0
creased muscle tone, which takes place almost 0 30 60 t,(s) 90

rhythmically every turn, seems to impede oxygen Fig. 2. Semischematic profile of the oxygen uptake vs time during
skiing (lower curve) and running on the treadmill (upper curve).
delivery. As a consequence, anaerobic metabolism is
The hatched area represents the difference in the aerobic yield
increased. Karlsson and Ollander (1972) showed that between the two exercises. The interrupted line represents the
during isometric contractions muscle lactate is greatly total energy request which is equal for the two exercises
316 F. Saibene et al.: Energy sources in alpine skiing (giant slalom)

compared. The area between the two curves repre- during training should concentrate more on impro-
sents the difference between the 02 consumed during ving the production of force and neuro-muscular
the two exercises and it amounts to 16.3 ml 02 9 kg -1. coordination in order to obtain better results.
This shows that, during the exercise on the treadmill,
the aerobic sources fulfill 67% of the total energy
Acknowledgements. The authors wish to thank the Italian Ski
Federation (FISI) and in particular Mr. F. Cotelli and the Scuola
request, while during skiing this contribution is only Militare Alpina of Courmayeur and in particular Major M. Blua
46%. From Fig. 2 it also appears that the kinetics of for the technical assistance during the experiments at Col Ch6-
1)o2 on-response is faster during skiing than during crouit.
running (tV2 is about 18 s in skiing vs 26 s in running). This work was in part supported by the Italian Olympic
Committee (CONI).
At the same work load a faster kinetics would imply a
higher contribution of aerobic sources and a smaller
02 debt. The faster 0 2 kinetics here observed, is References
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contribution of aerobic metabolism associated with a Blood lactic acid concentrations in high velocity swimming. In:
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