athlete's heart
- noun
- /ˈæθlitɪz hɑrt/
- Specialized
:
corazón de atleta
- The doctor explained that athlete's heart is a normal adaptation to intense physical training.
Examples
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She was relieved to learn her enlarged heart was just athlete's heart and not a disease.
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A routine checkup revealed signs of athlete's heart in several members of the cycling team.
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The doctor explained that an athlete's heart is often larger than normal.
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Many athletes' hearts adapt to intense training over time.
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A routine checkup revealed signs of athlete's heart in several members of the cycling team.
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She was relieved to learn her enlarged heart was just athlete's heart and not a disease.
-
The doctor explained that athlete's heart is a normal adaptation to intense physical training.
Synonyms
3
3.3
A heart that is larger than normal, often because of illness
1
8.1
A heart that is larger than normal and often seen on a chest X-ray
An unusually large heart
A heart that is larger than normal
How Healthy
Surface Forms
Morphology
athlete's + heart
The phrase is compositionally the heart belonging to an athlete, so a learner who knows 'athlete' and 'heart' can infer it refers to an athlete's heart in some sense. However, the specific medical meaning — an enlarged, training-related cardiac adaptation — is specialized and not fully predictable from the constituents alone, making the expression only partially transparent to a B1 learner.
Etymology
The term athlete's heart comes from the simple idea that the heart gets bigger and stronger in people who train hard, like a muscle. That's why doctors use 'athlete's heart' to mean a harmless, larger heart from exercise and 'not a disease'.