Extreme blood lactate rising after very short efforts in top-level track and field male sprinters

Two top-level (10”04 and 10”13 in 100-m dash) and 2 sub-elite (10”97 and 11”44 in 100-m dash) male sprinters completed, after a standardised warm-up, various jump, sprint and weightlifting exercises in two consecutive days at the start of pre-season. Before and 30 s after the tests, the [La−] were measured with a portable lactate analyser. The top-level sprinters exhibited much larger [La−] than the sub-elite sprinters (< 5 mmol·L-1) after all the exercise tests. The maximum values recorded were 20.4 mmol·L-1 after the 20-m sprint tests for Athlete 1, and 22.4 mmol·L-1 after CMJ testing for Athlete 2. The greater Δ% were recorded after CMJ testing for Athlete 1 (from 1.9 to 13.6 mmol·L-1), and after the power clean test for Athlete 2 (from 1.4 to 17.6 mmol·L-1). These results suggest a different metabolic response to very short efforts (≤3 s) in top-level track and field sprinters. These findings reinforce the need to include lactate assessments, during training and evaluation sessions, to better understand the acute and chronic adaptations to training of sprinters of different levels