A low cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF, measured as peakVO2) increases the risk of future development of disease, in particular diseases related to metabolic and cardiovascular dysregulation. Undertaking physical activity (PA) can boost peakVO2 and is protective against cardiometabolic diseases. However, it is not known whether there are time-sensitive periods in life where the benefits of PA are greatest and whether these periods differ in men versus women. Establishing the patterns of PA through life that optimise CRF would permit more targeted interventions to be designed.

It is likely that pathological processes begin much earlier in life than the development of clinical disease. Perturbations in skeletal muscle, specifically the energetics of muscle cells (governed by mitochondrial processes), have been implicated in early cardiometabolic disease processes. The relationship between early physiological differences in skeletal muscle energetics and predictors of future disease, such as a low peak VO2, are incompletely understood. This proposal aims to investigate whether or not differences in skeletal muscle energetics are related to differences in circulatory capacity, whether the relationship between them differs in men and women and the extent to which they are impacted by different patterns of physical activity throughout early life.