Each week in my Research Update, I distill the latest sports science research into practical insights to help you improve your training, performance, and recovery.

In this week’s update:

• Why a mentally draining day can take the edge off your hardest efforts
• Why the best warm-up depends on what you’re about to do
• When core training actually improves speed and power
  

Mental Fatigue Can Take the Edge Off Your Power and Sprint Capacity

 

This systematic review and meta-analysis pooled 17 randomized controlled trials involving 302 participants to examine what happens to high-intensity physical performance after mentally demanding tasks.

Lower-body explosive power, including measures like vertical jump performance, dropped by a small but statistically significant amount. Anaerobic capacity — the kind of output that matters during sprints and repeated high-intensity efforts — took a somewhat larger hit.

Interestingly, the effect didn’t appear to change meaningfully based on whether participants were highly trained, how long the mentally fatiguing task lasted, or which physical test was used. The overall effect is small, but consistent enough to suggest that what happens in your head before a session can carry over into what your body can produce. 

Why it matters:

Most of us aren’t walking into training mentally fresh. We’re coming from work, school, traffic, screens, meetings, and a full day of decisions.

This research suggests that mental fatigue probably isn’t going to ruin your workout, but it may shave a little off the explosive efforts where small differences matter most — sprinting, jumping, HYROX stations, hard intervals, and CrossFit-style work.

My thoughts:

I wouldn’t panic because you had a long day before training. The effect sizes here are small.

But for the sessions that actually matter — race day, testing, hard intervals, a key strength session — this is a good argument for keeping the hours beforehand as simple as possible.

If you can avoid turning race morning into an inbox cleanup, errands, and a pile of decisions before you even warm up, your legs may thank you.

There’s No Single “Best” Warm-Up: The Right Pre-Race Prep Depends on What You’re About to Do

This systematic review and network meta-analysis pooled 89 studies involving 1,609 high-level athletes to compare different acute pre-competition conditioning strategies.

Instead of asking which warm-up was best overall, the researchers separated the results based on the performance demand.

Post-activation performance enhancement (PAPE) ranked highest for explosive and jump performance. Foam rolling showed the largest effect for speed and change-of-direction, followed by dynamic stretching and PAPE. Ischemic preconditioning ranked well for sport-specific performance, while remote ischemic preconditioning performed best in the endurance comparisons.

The important takeaway isn’t that every athlete should copy whichever strategy ranked first. It’s that the best preparation depends on what you’re asking your body to do next. 

Why it matters:

“Warm up properly” is good advice, but it isn’t very useful on its own.

A cyclist preparing for a long aerobic effort doesn’t need the same physiological primer as someone getting ready to sprint, jump, lift, or race a HYROX heat. Your warm-up should reflect the demand of the event rather than follow the same template every time.

My thoughts:

I like that this study doesn’t really crown one universal winner, because there probably shouldn’t be one.

The network meta-analysis combines a lot of smaller and fairly different studies, so I’d treat the rankings as a menu of strategies worth experimenting with rather than a strict prescription.

The key is to test those changes in training first. Race morning is not the time to discover whether a new warm-up makes you feel amazing or completely flat.

Core Training Helps Speed and Jumping, Especially When Paired With Sport-Specific Work

This meta-analysis pooled 49 studies published between 2020 and June 2026 to examine whether core stabilization training actually translates into better athletic performance.

Across the studies, core training had a moderate positive effect on both speed and jumping performance.

But the details matter. Results varied depending on exercise selection, training intensity and frequency, athlete characteristics, and how core work was incorporated into the rest of the program. Core training appeared to work particularly well when it was combined with sport-specific sprinting, strength training, and plyometric work rather than treated as a completely separate training goal. 

Why it matters:

“Train your core” is one of those pieces of fitness advice that’s vague enough to mean almost anything.

For runners, cyclists, hybrid athletes, and field-sport athletes, this research suggests purposeful core work can support speed and explosiveness — but it works best as part of a complete program, not as a replacement for the training that actually makes you faster.

My thoughts:

This is the part I’d actually use: integration beats isolation.

If you’re short on time, I’d rather see a couple of purposeful core exercises added to the strength, sprint, or plyometric sessions you’re already doing than another standalone 30-minute ab workout.

Planks alone aren’t going to make you faster. Core training seems most useful when it helps you transfer force better during the movements that actually matter for your sport.

– That’s all for this week, train hard!

Learned Something Valuable and Want to Know More?

Read more on the Blonyx Blog, including our growing list of simple summaries of the latest sports science research and what it means for your training.