thermoregulation (exercise)

Last reviewed 07/2021

Exercise raises the core temperature of the body as heat is produced rapidly by the inefficient burning of energy sources within skeletal muscle - initially, too rapidly for compensatory mechanisms to counter.

However, an elevation of temperature is beneficial in that:

• it causes pre-capillary sphincters to vasodilate, so:
• increasing supply of nutrients to muscle
• increasing removal of waste products from muscle
• increasing heat loss in cutaneous capillaries and acting to lower core temperature
• ventilation rate is increased in frequency leading to increased evaporative heat loss
• the oxygen dissociation curve is shifted to the right, liberating more oxygen to muscles