The effect of heartbeat-synchronised running on the cardiovascular system

The possibility of promoting cardiac performance during running exercise was investigated with normal human subjects (N=10) running on a treadmill at a constant speed and level grade. The subject attempted to synchronise their step rate with their heart rate during running. To facilitate the synchronisation, the subject was presented an audio click derived from detection of the QRS complex in the electrocardiogram. The time delay between each QRS complex and the subsequent audio click signal was varied during running to induce different phases between step rate and heart rate. It was found that four out of ten subjects were able to achieve and maintain synchronisation between heart and step rates for extended periods. For the heartbeat-synchronised running, heart rate variation was observed when changing the phase between step rate and heart rate. Results suggest that synchronisation of step rate and heart rate at an optimum phase may improve cardiac performance.