Department of Sport Science, Faculty of Social Sciences, Swedish Olympic Committee Research Fellow, Linnaeus University, Växjö/Kalmar, Sweden.
School of Sport and Exercise Sciences, Faculty of Science, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK.
Scand J Med Sci Sports. 2024 Jan;34(1):e14327. doi: 10.1111/sms.14327. Epub 2023 Mar 9.
Low energy availability (LEA) occurs inadvertently and purposefully in many athletes across numerous sports; and well planned, supervised periods with moderate LEA can improve body composition and power to weight ratio possibly enhancing performance in some sports. LEA however has the potential to have negative effects on a multitude of physiological and psychological systems in female and male athletes. Systems such as the endocrine, cardiovascular, metabolism, reproductive, immune, mental perception, and motivation as well as behaviors can all be impacted by severe (serious and/or prolonged or chronic) LEA. Such widely diverse effects can influence the health status, training adaptation, and performance outcomes of athletes leading to both direct changes (e.g., decreased strength and endurance) as well as indirect changes (e.g., reduced training response, increased risk of injury) in performance. To date, performance implications have not been well examined relative to LEA. Therefore, the intent of this narrative review is to characterize the effects of short-, medium-, and long-term exposure to LEA on direct and indirect sports performance outcomes. In doing so we have focused both on laboratory settings as well as descriptive athletic case-study-type experiential evidence.
低能量状态（LEA）在许多运动项目的运动员中都会不经意间或有意地出现；而经过精心计划和监督的适度 LEA 期可以改善身体成分和力量体重比，可能会提高某些运动的表现。然而，LEA 有可能对女性和男性运动员的许多生理和心理系统产生负面影响。诸如内分泌、心血管、代谢、生殖、免疫、心理感知和动机以及行为等系统都可能受到严重（严重和/或长期或慢性）LEA 的影响。如此广泛的影响会影响运动员的健康状况、训练适应和表现结果，导致直接变化（例如，力量和耐力下降）和间接变化（例如，训练反应降低，受伤风险增加）。迄今为止，相对于 LEA，对其对运动表现的影响还没有进行很好的研究。因此，本综述的目的是描述短期、中期和长期暴露于 LEA 对直接和间接运动表现结果的影响。在这样做的过程中，我们既关注了实验室环境，也关注了描述性的运动案例研究类型的经验证据。
