The diaphragm's job is to help pump the carbon dioxide out of the lungs and pull the oxygen into the lungs. The diaphragm is a sheet of muscle that lines the bottom of the chest. When the diaphragm contracts, oxygen is pulled into the lungs and when the diaphragm relaxes, carbon dioxide is forced out of the lungs. This is how the actual act of breathing takes place
The cardiovascular system
Your cardiovascular system transports important substances around your body. The cardiovascular system consists of the heart, blood and blood vessels. The blood vessels, which include arteries, arterioles, capillaries, venules and veins, are responsible for the transport of blood to and away from the heart. They also carry blood to and away from muscles and organs. Your blood is responsible for bringing the oxygen you breathe in from your lungs to the muscles and organs that need it. In addition, it carries other important substances such as hormones and nutrients around your body and removes the waste products that your body produces, such as carbon dioxide, lactic acid, etc.
The heart is the most important part of the cardiovascular system, as it is what pumps the blood around the body and to the lungs. The heart consists of four chambers, two on either side of the heart. The bottom two are called ventricles and the top two are called the atria. The right side of the heart receives de-oxygenated blood from the body and pumps it to the lungs to be oxygenated. The left side of the heart receives oxygenated blood from the lungs and sends it to the rest of the body. This it what is know as a dual pump because both the left and right sides of the heart pump simultaneously. When training the body will begin to build up in waste products such as lactic acid and carbon dioxide, the cardiovascular system helps to prevent this build up by keeping muscles oxygenated and carrying out the waste products. In sport the cardiovascular system is vital in keeping us able to compete and reducing fatigue.
After researching both systems I can now compare the two. I now know that one would be useless without the other. Without the cardiovascular system, the oxygenated blood would not be of any use because it wouldn’t be being pumped around the body, and without the respiratory system, oxygen would never get oxygenated at all. Both the cardiovascular and respiratory systems work hand-in-hand to keep our body functioning properly.
The experiment
To perform the tests the class split into two groups, one aerobic and one anaerobic. Before exercising everybody from each group recorded their heart rate and blood pressure to compare with what it will be after exercise. We all then went into the gym and carried out the type of training specific to the groups we were in for about 20 minutes. The aerobic group went on the treadmills, the rowing machine, the climbers or the cycling machines and did a low to medium intensity work out for the 20 minutes. Whereas each member of the anaerobic group did 3 sets of 20 reps on the bench press, bicep curl, lat pull down, tricep pull down and other weights related exercises at high intensity for short periods of time throughout the 20 minutes.
Results
These are the results I recorded from both groups.
Anaerobic group
Before exercise…
After exercise…
Aerobic group
Before exercise…
After exercise…
Evaluation
After analysing the results it is obvious to see that there was a general increase in both blood pressure and heart for almost everyone who took part. I have made the results of my own blood pressure void because I believe it was a faulty reading. I was expecting to see a much more dramatic increase in blood pressure from the anaerobic group than the aerobic group. This did not happen, I believe it may be due to the anaerobic group being more anaerobically fit than the aerobic group were aerobically fit. It may also have been that, because there was only one person taking the whole group’s blood pressure, the anaerobic group had to wait longer after exercise giving their blood pressure time to decrease. I expected to see higher blood pressure from the anaerobic group because in a high intensity anaerobic work out, the muscles need large amounts of energy in a small space of time. This means that a lot of blood is needed at once, which causes high blood pressure. This is why in strong man competitions they often get nosebleeds because of the massive blood pressure.
There is a much higher increase in heart rate after aerobic activity than anaerobic activity. This is because when doing aerobic exercise, your heart needs to pump blood to the worked muscles for a longer period of time in order to prevent fatigue and maintain a steady oxygen supply.
If I were to do this experiment again I would make sure there was more than one person taking blood pressure reading and ask for everybody waiting for their recording to keep exercising until their turn. I would also try and get bigger groups for more accurate results to analyse. I would also make sure that all of the equipment we used to record results was accurate and worked properly.
