Exercise and Recovery Responses of Lymphokines to Heavy Resistance Exercise

To examine the effect of dynamic resistance exercise on the response patterns of lymphokines, 10 strength-trained men (21.7 ± 0.6 y) performed 2 resistance exercise protocols, high force (HF) and high power (HP), of equal total work (HF = 33.0 ± 2.5 kJ; HP = 33.3 ± 2.7 kJ) in a randomized order separated by 1 week. Resting blood samples were obtained preexercise and 0 (R-0), 15 (R-15), and 240 (R-240) minutes postexercise. Plasma lactate significantly (p < 0.05) increased from baseline for both protocols; however, concentrations were higher in response to the HF protocol. Plasma interleukin-2 (IL-2) concentrations were significantly decreased from baseline at R-15 following the HF protocol. Plasma interfer-on-gamma (IFN-γ) concentrations decreased at R-0 following the HP protocol and returned to preexercise levels by R-15. Although the suppression of these 2 lymphokines was transient, the results indicate that the acute stress of high force and high resistance workouts induce differential IFN-γ and IL-2 responses.