Unravelling Energy Issues Underpinning Low Energy Availability in High Performance Athletes
Australian Catholic University
20 participants
Jun 1, 2025
INTERVENTIONAL
Conditions
Summary
The goal of this clinical trial is to understand how the body responds to short-term, severe low energy availability (LEA) in healthy, weight-bearing endurance athletes aged 18-45 years old. LEA describes a mismatch between an individual's dietary energy intake and the energy cost of their commitments for training and competition. The main questions this trial aims to answer are: 1. What effect does short-term, severe LEA have on sleeping metabolic rate? 2. What effect does short-term, severe LEA have on other body systems identified within the Relative Energy Deficiency in Sport (REDs) Health and Performance Conceptual models? Researchers will compare a control trial with both a LEA trial achieved through diet restriction and a LEA trial achieved through increased exercise to see if there are differences in the body's response. Participants will complete three 6-day trials, a minimum of 3-weeks apart, involving: * Prescribed diet (all food provided) * Prescribed running and/or cycling exercise * Two visits to ACU Fitzroy campus for blood tests and exercise testing * 50 hour stay (two nights and two days) in the ACU metabolic chamber
Eligibility
Plain Language Summary
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Interventions
6-days of severe low energy availability (LEA, 15kcal/kg FFM/d), achieved by superimposing restricted energy intake on the control trial.
6-days of severe low energy availability (LEA, 15kcal/kg FFM/d), achieved by superimposing increased exercise energy expenditure on the control trial.
Locations(1)
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NCT07026175