Does Competitive Swimming During Puberty Affect Lung Development?
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Whether or not competitive swimming (CS) accentuates lung development beyond genetically endowed growth has been widely debated. PURPOSE: Given that peak growth velocities for the lungs occur during puberty, this longitudinal study aimed to determine if one season of CS affected lung development in pubertal females. METHODS: Female swimmers (SWIM; n=11, 3.3±1.7 y of CS experience, 19±8 km swimming/week) and healthy active controls (CON; n=10) underwent pulmonary function testing before (PRE) and after (POST) one season of CS (7.3±0.5 months). The groups were matched for age (SWIM 12.4±0.8 vs CON 13.2±1.3; p=0.10), height (PRE 161±8 vs 158±7, POST 163±7 vs 161±7 cm; p=0.38) and weight (PRE 52±11 vs 46±5, POST 56±10 vs 49±6 kg; p=0.10). Sexual maturity rating was self-reported to be pubertal (Tanner stages 2-4) for all of the SWIM and 90% of CON. Changes in lung volumes, spirometry, diffusion capacity (DLCO), and maximal inspiratory (MIP) and expiratory (MEP) mouth pressures were compared using 2-way mixed model ANOVA. RESULTS: Despite having a similar body size as controls, swimmers had a larger total lung capacity (TLC; PRE 4.73±0.73 vs 3.93±0.46, POST 5.08±0.68 vs 4.19±0.64 l; p < 0.01). Forced vital capacity (PRE 3.92±0.71 vs 3.13±0.50, POST 4.15±0.61 vs 3.28±0.54 l; p < 0.01) and peak expiratory flow (PRE 6.48±0.92 vs 5.70±0.86, POST 6.97±0.84 vs 6.00±0.77 l/s; p=0.03) were higher in SWIM. Although DLCO was greater in SWIM (PRE 23.4±2.6 vs 20.7±1.9, POST 24.1±1.9 vs 21.0±3.2 ml/min/mmHg; p=0.01), there was no difference when expressed relative to alveolar volume (PRE 5.1±0.6 vs 5.4±0.4, POST 4.9±0.6 vs 5.2±0.4 ml/min/mmHg/l; p=0.20). Both MIP (PRE 87±26 vs 71±24, POST 103±22 vs 79±26 cm H2O, p=0.06) and MEP (PRE 112±17 vs 98±18, POST 114±13 vs 84±19 cm H2O; p < 0.001) were greater in SWIM. Changes from PRE to POST were similar between groups (interactions p > 0.05). No association between CS training volume (km/week) and change in lung size (delta TLC) (r=-0.02, p=0.95) was found. CONCLUSION: This data shows that pubertal female swimmers already had larger lung capacities, higher flows, and greater indices of respiratory muscle strength compared to matched controls. One season of CS did not further accentuate this enhanced function, suggesting that CS during puberty did not affect lung development. Support: NSERC.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".