Cardiovascular coupling during postural challenge in athletes and non-athletes

The aim of this study was to assess the cardiovascular coupling strength during an active postural maneuver in athletes and non-athletes. We studied 30 men athletes and 25 men sedentary subjects in supine condition and during active postural maneuver. Joint symbolic analysis (JSA) method based on the definition of symbolic HP-SAP patterns and the rate of their simultaneous occurrence was applied. We found that JSA was able to detect the expected increase of cardiovascular coupling strength at slow time scales in response to active standing only in athletes. This result suggests that athletes can cope with the postural challenge with a more powerful association between HP and SAP variability.