Correlation between anaerobic power and muscle oxygenation during Wingate testing

This study investigated the correlation between anaerobic power parameters [peak power (PP), average power (AP), fatigue index (FI), and muscle oxygen saturation (SmO₂)] during a 30-s Wingate anaerobic test (WANT) in 32 healthy male college students. Muscle oxygenation was monitored via near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) on the right quadriceps. Results revealed a significant positive correlation between resting SmO₂ and both PP (r = 0.762, p < 0.001) and AP (r = 0.717, p = 0.001), indicating that higher baseline oxygenation predicts greater anaerobic power output. During exercise, SmO₂ declined gradually from 61.63 to 54.75% (0-10 s, phosphocreatine-dominant phase) followed by a sharp decrease to 9.78% (10-30 s, glycolytic-dominant phase). Strong negative correlations emerged between SmO₂ and FI from 15 to 30 s (r = - 0.952 to - 0.972, p < 0.01), linking oxygen depletion to fatigue accumulation. These findings suggest that resting SmO₂ may serve as a predictor of anaerobic capacity, while real-time SmO₂ dynamics (particularly the 10 s inflection point) could optimize training strategies, though further validation in diverse populations is warranted.