95% of researchers rate our articles as excellent or good
Learn more about the work of our research integrity team to safeguard the quality of each article we publish.
Find out more
ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Sports Act. Living
Sec. Exercise Physiology
Volume 7 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fspor.2025.1556989
This article is part of the Research Topic Responses and Adaptations to Novel Exercise Modalities View all 14 articles
Acute changes in urinary metabolites: vinyasa yoga compared to cycle ergometer exercise
Provisionally accepted- 1 University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, Alaska, United States
- 2 University of Montana, Missoula, United States
Increased interest in unconventional exercise such as vinyasa yoga has outpaced our understanding of the physiological response to yoga exercise. The objective of the current study was to evaluate changes in urinary metabolites (ie., alanine, phenylalanine, glycine, choline, taurine, creatinine, creatine, dimethylamine, citrate, pyruvate, acetate, and beta-hydroxybutyrate) elicited by vinyasa yoga compared to moderate intensity aerobic exercise in young healthy adults. Twelve participants, six women and six men, completed a vinyasa yoga exercise session (VY) and a moderate intensity cycle ergometer exercise session (ME) in a sequential fashion.The intensity of the ME was matched to heart rate and rating of perceived exertion elicited during the initial VY. Urine samples were collected at baseline and following the completion of each of VY and ME. Metabolite concentrations after each exercise were normalized to their baseline levels to obtain a relative exercise-induced change in concentration. We hypothesized that activation of large muscle groups in the lower extremities would foster greater ME-induced alterations in metabolites. Exercise-induced changes in urinary concentrations of phenylalanine, creatinine, creatine, glycine, choline, taurine, dimethylamine, citrate, pyruvate, alanine, and betahydroxybutyrate were greater in ME compared to VY (P<0.05). There was no difference between the exercise-induced changes in lactate between groups (P<0.05). The results of this study demonstrate that ME promotes more robust changes in urinary metabolites compared to VY. These differences may be due to a greater localized workload on the large muscle groups of the lower extremities during ME, and potentially highlight the distributed metabolic demand of VY.
Keywords: Urine, Metabolism, Exercise modality, Nuclear magenetic resonance, Unconventional Exercise
Received: 07 Jan 2025; Accepted: 28 Mar 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Campbell, Murphy, Barati and Coker. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Robert Harold Coker, University of Montana, Missoula, United States
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.