Statistical Analysis
pain
Differences in TT completion time (hypothesis 1) were tested using a two-tailed paired-samples Differences in RPE, perceived pain intensity (hypothesis 2), and heart rate between conditions during the Pre-load trial were tested using a two-way ANOVA with treatment factor with two fixed levels (TRAM, PLAC) and a repeated measures time factor with three time-points (10 min, 20 min, and 30 min).Data are presented as means ± SD unless otherwise stated. All data were checked for the assumptions associated with the statistical tests. For all two-way ANOVAs, a Greenhouse–Geisser correction was used where assumptions of sphericity were violated. Cohen’s d (interpreted as 0.2–0.5 small effect, 0.5–0.8 medium effect, ≥ 0.8 large effect) and partial eta squared (ηFor two participants, the difference in TT completion time between the tramadol and placebo condition was an outlier in relation to the wider data set (i.e., difference in completion time between the two conditions was greater than 2 standard deviations outside of the mean of the group), and were removed from the analysis. One of the outliers had a faster tramadol time, the other had a faster placebo time. Key study outcomes were not changed by the removal of these data sets. Due to small sections of missing data during the TT, analysis was conducted on the power output data of 