ENERGY SPECIFICITY OF ROCK CLIMBING AND AEROBIC CAPACITY IN COMPETITIVE SPORT ROCK CLIMBERS

Over the past few years, competitive rock climbing has experienced inc reased popularity world wide, In 1989, the first six-event World Cup c ompetition was held with all events contested on artificial modular wa lls. The aim of this study was to determine the extent to which oxydat ive metabolism is utilized in competitive rock climbing with regard to the climber's maximal O-2 consumption (VO2(max)). VO2max-was measured with two direct triangular protocols: the first from running (''runni ng'' VO2max) and the second from pull offs performed with arms and bef ore arms (''pulling'') VO2). Moreover, VO2 was also before measured du ring two competitive climbing routes difficulty quantified 7b on the E uropean numerical scale ranging from 5 to 9. However these routes had different profiles: route 1 was more complex from the informational as pect, holds being smaller and more difficult to see even though the se cond route was presumed harder from the physical point of view, the ho lds being bigger but the profile being steeper. The first and the seco nd route involved only 45.6% and 37.7% of the ''running'' VO2max but 1 11.6% and 92.3% of the ''pulling'' VO2max. Heart rates (HR) were equal to 176 bpm and 159 bpm i.e. 85.5% and 77% of maximal HR respectively, Blood lactate collected three minutes after the end of the two ascent s were 5.7 mmol . l(-1) and 4.3 mmol . l(-1). The paired ''t'' test in dicated no significant differences in heart rates for the two exercise s conditon i.e. climbing route, These results suggest that the competi tive rock climbing elicit particularly arms since heart rate is high f or a relatively low value of VO2. Moreover climbing VO2 closed to maxi mum ''pulling'' VO2. However, VO2 and maximal blood lactate mere signi ficatively different (p<0,01 and 0.05 respectively).