The impact of oral peppermint supplementation on rate of fatigue and recovery of contemporary dancers, following high intensity dance activity / Chloe Travers (2017)

Aim: Dancers are known to have demanding schedules with high work volumes, however, at present there is a lack of literature, exploring the impact of recovery strategies within a dance specific context. Equally, there are no dance specific studies investigating the impact of peppermint on recovery. This study aims to examine the effect of peppermint supplementation on dancers’ rate of fatigue and recovery, in order to help dancers’ meet the challenging demands often placed upon them.

Methods: 7 contemporary dance students (19.7 ± 2 years old) completed the study. Participants ingested either diluted peppermint essential oil or water for 10 days. Dependent variables (blood lactate, jump height, rating of fatigue, muscle soreness) were measured on days 8-10 at different time points, before and/or after a high intensity dance fitness test.

Results: Peppermint supplementation was found to have no statistically significant effect on the dependent variables. This is likely to be due to the small sample size. Treatment group means suggest that peppermint may have a beneficial impact. The Peppermint treatment group were found to accumulate less blood lactate during exercise (5.4 mmol.L-1)than the placebo treatment group (9.5 mmol.L-1), perceived less muscle soreness at each time point, and had greater recovery of fatigue and jump height during 48 hours post HIDPFT. Conclusion: The study suggests that peppermint supplementation may enhance specific factors of dancers’ recovery following high intensity dance activity. Further research, with a larger sample size is needed to determine the significance of these effects.