Heart rate variability, mood and performance: a pilot study on the interrelation of these variables in amateur road cyclists

Carla Alfonso; Lluis Capdevila

doi:10.7717/peerj.13094

Heart rate variability, mood and performance: a pilot study on the interrelation of these variables in amateur road cyclists

PeerJ. 2022 Mar 30:10:e13094. doi: 10.7717/peerj.13094. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Carla Alfonso^{1

2}, Lluis Capdevila^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Laboratory of Sport Psychology, Department of Basic Psychology, Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
² Sport Research Institute, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.

Abstract

Objective: The present study seeks to explore the relationship between measures of cycling training on a given day and the heart rate variability (HRV) and mood states obtained the following morning. The association between HRV and mood state is also studied, as is the relationship between internal and external measures of training.

Methods: During a 6-week period, five recreational road cyclists collected 123 recordings of morning HRV and morning mood, and 66 recordings of training power and rate of perceived exertion (RPE). Training power was used as an external measure of performance and RPE as an internal measure of performance. The HRV parameters used in the study were the mean of RR intervals (mean RR) and the standard deviation of all RR intervals (SDNN) as time domain analysis, and the normalized high frequency band (HFnu), normalized low frequency band (LFnu) and the ratio between low and high frequency bands, as frequency domain analysis. Mood was measured using a 10-point cognitive scale.

Results: It was found that the higher the training power on a given day, the lower the HFnu and the higher LF/HF were on the following morning. At the same time, results showed an inverse relationship between training and mood, so the tougher a training session, the lower the mood the following day. A relationship between morning HRV and mood was also found, so that the higher mean RR and HFnu, the more positive the mood (r = 0.497 and r = 0.420 respectively; p < 0.001). Finally, RPE correlated positively with external power load variables (IF: r = 0.545; p < 0.001).

Conclusion: Altogether, the results indicate a relationship between training of cyclists on a given day and their morning HRV and mood state on the following day. Mood and HRV also seem positively related. It is argued that developing a monitoring system that considers external and internal training loads, together with morning mood, could help understand the state of the individual, enabling feedback to athletes to facilitate the adaptation to training and to prevent problems associated with overtraining. However, more research is needed to further understand the association between the different variables considered.

Keywords: Athletes; HRV; Heart rate variability; Mood; Performance; Training load.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Athletes
Bicycling*
Electrocardiography*
Heart Rate / physiology
Humans
Pilot Projects

Grants and funding

This study was supported by the grant PID2019-107473RB-C21 from the “Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación” of the Spanish Government. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.