SCIENCE AND TRAINING IN HYPOXIA

Exposure to altitude has long been considered an important source of health benefits, even without knowing well that such effects could be caused. Spas and hotels in different places have been recommended for the improvement of many ailments, perhaps due to their waters or their distance from the most inhabited places, and therefore more polluted. From the famous Olympic Games of 1968 in Mexico it became evident to the whole world the importance that could have the height with respect to the athletic benefits, but few were the countries that made a good prevention so that their athletes were not affected for the not favorable effects of exposure to height, which also has them when you are not used to it or, more technically, adapted. Before that date and by then, there had already been considerable progress in the knowledge of the exhibition to the height, marking the path to the famous rise of Hillary and Tensing to Mount Everest in 1953. ADAPTATION TO ALTITUDE: a biochemical process in our cells Houston and cols, in 1946, had carried out a first Operation Everest (OEI), which consisted in holding 8 volunteers in a hypobaric chamber for a month, and simulate during this time an approach and climb to the top of Mount Everest, controlling different physiological variables based on the means at that time. A large group of scientists participated in the organisation of a new Everest Operation in 1985 and many results were obtained that have been published in more than 40 articles in different specialised journals. But, in fact, it is not until 1992 that Semenza et alius describe the cellular response to hypoxia and therefore the bases of man's adaptation to hypoxia. The research of Semenza et alius shows that all the cells of our body are sensitive to different oxygen levels, generating a response that sets in motion various genes to create in the same cell better conditions to face their survival in those conditions of lack of oxygen. This is, therefore, what happens with exposure to hypoxia: the induction of a genetically mediated response that enables the survival of an individual in conditions of lower oxygen supply. This would have been the door to interpret what happened with sports practice in extreme situations, and how athletes should adapt to these conditions to improve their performance. And it is in 1997 when Levine and Stray-Gundersen publish their landmark work in which they show that residence at height, combined with lower-level sports training, induces an improvement in sports performance. From here, the increase in published literature on the effects of height on performance, both positive and negative, has been exponential, generating a "noise" from which it is very difficult to draw definitive conclusions. That's when we have to go back to the origins, and try to understand each step taken.