Exercise Training but Not Genetically Determined Exercise Capacity Reduces Cardiac Ischemia–Reperfusion Injury in Rats with High Intrinsic Aerobic Capacity

Background: Low aerobic exercise capacity is associated with high morbidity and mortality in healthy humans. Furthermore, low exercise capacity is associated with worse outcome in cardiac disease. However, exercise capacity is composed of an intrinsic (genetically determined) and an extrinsic (environmentally determined) component. The rat model of genetically determined high (HCR) and low (LCR) aerobic exercise capacity allows to disentangle these both components of exercise capacity. We aimed to assess the impact of genetically determined exercise capacity in combination with exercise training on cardiac function during ischemia-reperfusion of HCR and LCR.