The purpose of the present study was to relate the training-induced alterations in lactate kinetics parameters to the concomitant changes in time to exhaustion (T(lim)) at a work rate corresponding to maximal oxygen uptake (Pa(peak)). Eight subjects performed before and after training i) an incremental exercise up to exhaustion to determine Pa(peak), ii) a 5-min 90 % Pa(peak) exercise followed by a 90-min passive recovery to determine an individual blood lactate recovery curve fitted to the bi-exponential time function: La(t) = La(0) + A1(1 - e -gamma1 x t) + A2(1 - e -gamma2 x t), and iii) a time to exhaustion at Pa peak to determine T lim. A biopsy of the vastus lateralis muscle was made before and after training. The training programme consisted in pedalling on a cycle ergometer 2 h a day, 6 days a week, for 4 weeks. Training-induced increases (p < 0.05) in Pa(peak), muscle capillary density, citrate synthase activity, gamma2 that denotes the lactate removal ability (from 0.0547 +/- 0.0038 to 0.0822 +/- 0.0071 min (-1)) and T(lim) (from 299 +/- 23 to 486 +/- 63 s), decreases (p < 0.05) in activities of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) and muscle type of LDH, the phosphofructokinase/citrate synthase activities ratio and the estimated net amount of lactate released (NALR) during exercise recovery (from 66.5 +/- 8.6 to 47.2 +/- 11.1 mmol) were also observed. The improvement of T (lim) with training was related to the increase in gamma2 (r = 0.74, p = 0.0367) and to the decrease in NALR (r = 0.77, p = 0.0250). These results suggest that the post-training greater ability to remove lactate from the organism and reduced muscle lactate accumulation during exercise account for the concomitant improvement of the time to exhaustion during high-intensity exercise performed at the same relative work rate.