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Peter Krustrup

Chair of Health Sciences 
Department of Sports Science and Clinical Biomechanics

Email: pkrustrup@health.sdu.dk
Webpage: https://portal.findresearcher.sdu.dk/en/persons/pkrustrup

PhD. Peter Krustrup is Professor of Sport and Health Sciences at the Department of Sports Science and Clinical Biomechanics at SDU and an Honorary Visiting Professor at the University of Exeter, United Kingdom and Shanghai University of Sport, China since 2013 and 2018 respectively.

Professor Peter Krustrup received his PhD. from the University of Copenhagen in 2004. In 2007 he went on to become Vice Head of Department at the University of Copenhagen, and Full Professor of Sport and Health Sciences at the University of Exeter from 2011 to 2013. In 2016 he became a Full Professor at SDU.

As of December 2020, he has written 336 peer-reviewed articles, 53 as first author and 107 as last author. Over the last two years, he has published 61 articles in high-impact journals, such as Bri J Sports Med and Progress in Cardiovasc Diseases. He has received multiple awards including the “Men’s Health Award” in 2010 and the Danish Football Association ”A Part of Something Bigger” award in 2014, and “Danskernes Idrætspris” in 2017. He has also been nominated for “Kulturministerens Idrætspris” three times in 2008, 2013 and 2018. In 2011 he was included in Marquis Who’s Who in the World. Over the last decade, Peter Krustrup has contributed to the development of a series of strong evidence-based “Sport for Health” concepts, including “FIT FIRST”, “11 for Health in Europe” and “Football Fitness After Breast Cancer”. He has also initiated the international “Football is Medicine” platform with more than 250 researchers from 25 countries.

Professor Peter Krustrup's research interests consist of two main areas: Fitness and health effects of physical activity across the lifespan with special reference to team. This includes investigations of the link between the locomotor activities and physiological demands of various sports disciplines and other types of physical activity types, the cardiovascular, metabolic and musculoskeletal adaptations after short and long-term interventions, and the potential for prevention, treatment and rehabilitation of lifestyle-related diseases, such as hypertension, obesity, type 2 diabetes and osteoporosis, and also for men with prostate cancer and women with breast cancer.

Furthermore, he examines sports performance, fatigue, training and testing of male and female elite athletes. This includes analysis of physiological demands and locomotor activities in training and match-play for elite athletes and the general population, fatigue, recovery, development of sport-specific testing protocols, reliability and validity of tests concerning sports performance, effects of aerobic training, anaerobic training, strength training, sprint training and agility training for elite and recreational athletes and effects of environmental factors, playing surface and diet manipulation on performance and recovery.

Peter Krustrup is also a UEFA Pro-License football coach, currently working as a Fitness Coach for the Danish Women’s National Team.

For more information about Professor Peter Krustrup, please refer to the SDU Research Portal.

Peter Krustrup