ReviewSports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.)2009
Is it time to retire the 'central governor'?
Review in Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.), 2009. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 23 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
23 citing papers in PubMed.
- Effect of intensive prior exercise on muscle fiber activation, oxygen uptake kinetics, and oxygen uptake plateau occurrence.European journal of applied physiology · 2020Trial
- Pacing strategies during repeated maximal voluntary contractions.European journal of applied physiology · 2014Trial
- Perspective: thermo-sensation to thermoregulation: advancing the anticipation debate via transient receptor potential (TRP) channels.European journal of applied physiology · 2026Review
- Lessons from history forFrontiers in physiology · 2025Review
- State of Knowledge on Molecular Adaptations to Exercise in Humans: Historical Perspectives and Future Directions.Comprehensive Physiology · 2022Article
- Why Pheidippides could not believe in the 'Central Governor Model': Popper's philosophy applied to choose between two exercise physiology theories.Sports medicine and health science · 2022Review
- The Problem of Effort Distribution in Heavy Glycolytic Trials with Special Reference to the 400 m Dash in Track and Field.Biology · 2022Review
- Effects of different exercise intensities of race-walking on brain functional connectivity as assessed by functional near-infrared spectroscopy.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2022Article
- The Oxygen Uptake Plateau-A Critical Review of the Frequently Misunderstood Phenomenon.Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.) · 2021Review
- Effects of Acute Normobaric Hypoxia on Non-linear Dynamics of Cardiac Autonomic Activity During Constant Workload Cycling Exercise.Frontiers in physiology · 2019Article
- Response to: Lessons from Popper for science, paradigm shifts, scientific revolutions and exercise physiology.BMJ open sport & exercise medicine · 2018Article
- The effect of prior knowledge of test endpoint on non-local muscle fatigue.European journal of applied physiology · 2017Article
- Lessons from Popper for science, paradigm shifts, scientific revolutions and exercise physiology.BMJ open sport & exercise medicine · 2017Review
- The Nature of Self-Regulatory Fatigue and "Ego Depletion": Lessons From Physical Fatigue.Personality and social psychology review : an official journal of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc · 2016Article
- The Central Governor Model of Exercise Regulation Teaches Us Precious Little about the Nature of Mental Fatigue and Self-Control Failure.Frontiers in psychology · 2016Review
- Knowledge of repetitions range affects force production in trained females.Journal of sports science & medicine · 2014Article
- How the brain decides when to work and when to rest: dissociation of implicit-reactive from explicit-predictive computational processes.PLoS computational biology · 2014Article
- Fatigue is a Brain-Derived Emotion that Regulates the Exercise Behavior to Ensure the Protection of Whole Body Homeostasis.Frontiers in physiology · 2012Article
- Hemodialysis fatigue: just "simple" fatigue or a syndrome on its own right?Frontiers in physiology · 2012Article
- Interactive processes link the multiple symptoms of fatigue in sport competition.Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.) · 2011Review
Corrections and comments
- Commented on by
- Commented on by
- Commented on by
Authors and funding
1 author.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Over the past 13 years, Noakes and his colleagues have argued repeatedly for the existence of a 'Central Governor', a specific brain centre that provides a feed-forward regulation of the intensity of vigorous effort in order to conserve homeostasis, protecting vital organs such as the brain, heart and skeletal muscle against damage from hyperthermia, ischaemia and other manifestations of catastrophic failure. This brief article reviews evidence concerning important corollaries of the hypothesis, examining the extent of evolutionary pressures for the development of such a mechanism, the effectiveness of protection against hyperthermia and ischaemia during exhausting exercise, the absence of peripheral factors limiting peak performance (particularly a plateauing of cardiac output and oxygen consumption) and proof that electromyographic activity is limiting exhausting effort. As yet, there is a lack of convincing experimental evidence to support these corollaries of the hypothesis; furthermore, some findings, such as the rather consistent demonstration of an oxygen consumption plateau in young adults, argue strongly against the limiting role of a 'Central Governor'.
Indexed as
Identifiers
19691362What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.