The Effect of Contrast Water Therapy on Lood Lactate Recovery and Subsequent Performance of Trained Female Swimmers

This study investigated the effect of water immersion and passive recovery on blood lactate and subsequent swimming performance. Ten trained female swimmers, age (17.8 ±2.2), height (164.5 5.8 cm), weight (59.2 9.9 kg), %BF (22.4 1.7) and BMI (21.8 5.4kg/m2) completed three experimental trials differing in 15 min recovery intervention three times a week with 48 hrs distance: land (sitting near the pool) (PAS), contrast water therapy (CWT) (alternating hot 40, 2 min/cold 23, 1min) and cold water immersion(CWI)(23). Before and after 100meters front crawl and each three minute during of recovery blood lactate, heart rate and skin temperature were recorded. Participants repeated 100meters front crawl after the recovery.Repeated measure and LSD were used for data analysis. In all statistical analyses, the threshold for significance was set at (p0.05). Results showed that Heart rate decreased significantly in CWI toward PAS. Lactate removal was largest in CWT compared to the PAS. Skin temperature and fatigue decreased significantly after immersion and significant difference was observed in subsequent performance after immersion toward PAS. So it seems immersion conditions, can enhance quality of recovery.