Blood Pressure Responses to Postexercise Circulatory Occlusion Are Attenuated After Exercise-Induced Muscle Weakness

Exercise blood pressure (BP) responses are thought to be determined by relative exercise intensity (percent maximal voluntary contraction (MVC) strength). However, cross-sectional studies report that during a static contraction, higher absolute force is associated with greater BP responses to relative intensity exercise and subsequent muscle metaboreflex activation with postexercise circulatory occlusion (PECO). We hypothesized that a bout of unaccustomed eccentric exercise would reduce knee extensor MVC and subsequently attenuate BP responses to PECO.

Continuous BP, heart rate, muscle oxygenation, and knee extensor electromyography were recorded in 21 young healthy individuals (female, n = 10) during 2 min of 20% MVC static knee extension exercise and 2 min of PECO, performed before and 24 h after 300 maximal knee extensor eccentric contractions to cause exercise-induced muscle weakness. As a control, 14 participants repeated the eccentric exercise 4 wks later to test whether BP responses were altered when exercise-induced muscle weakness was attenuated via the protective effects of the repeated bout effect.

Eccentric exercise reduced MVC in all participants (144 ± 43 vs 110 ± 34 N·m, P < 0.0001). BP responses to matched relative intensity static exercise (lower absolute force) were unchanged after eccentric exercise ( P > 0.99) but were attenuated during PECO (systolic BP: 18 ± 10 vs 12 ± 9 mm Hg, P = 0.02). Exercise-induced muscle weakness modulated the deoxygenated hemoglobin response to static exercise (64% ± 22% vs 46% ± 22%, P = 0.04). When repeated after 4 wks, exercise-induced weakness after eccentric exercise was attenuated (-21.6% ± 14.3% vs -9.3 ± 9.7, P = 0.0002) and BP responses to PECO were not different from control values (all, P > 0.96).

BP responses to muscle metaboreflex activation, but not exercise, are attenuated by exercise-induced muscle weakness, indicating a contribution of absolute exercise intensity on muscle metaboreflex activation.