Tag Archives: breathing

The sport of swimming involves your head being submerged in water most of the time so it is important to gain the correct swimming balance.  The majority of swimmers put a lot of concentration, practice, focus and effort into improving their swimming style. However, if the basic breathing techniques are not being followed all this effort goes to waste and what happens is the swimming stroke will lose its smoothness. It is essential that anyone who swims professionally or swims to get fit follows the correct breathing techniques and exercises.  Initially at the beginning it may be challenging to focus on breathing and executing the swimming stroke, but with...

Running is a form of aerobic exercise. Quite literally, 'aerobic' means 'with oxygen'. We need to breathe to get oxygen into the lungs.  Although this sounds obvious, some runners have a shallow or laboured breathing style.  However, there are some cases where this style of breathing results in severe muscle cramps, side stitches, poor performance or premature fatigue. Not only that, shallow breathing can also result in anxiety, which can be counter-productive if you run for relaxation. Anxiety also causes physical tension which can result in a loss of energy - resulting in less energy for your workout.

Deep Breathing

The majority of runners only use...

Ian Locke, founder of Thrive Personal Training in Swindon, provides personal training in a private gym as well as nutritional analysis to help clients reach their health and fitness goals.

Here he tells us how he’s been getting on with his second week of POWERbreathe K5 training…

So the second week of my POWERbreathe training is complete, but there isn’t a lot of progress to report. In fact, my test results regressed slightly this week, but then that can sometimes be expected with muscle development. Now that I’ve got a bit of history in the Breathe-link PC software, I’ve been trying to make sense of the charts, but my results are all up...

Our bodies respond to exercise in a variety of ways to increase efficiency. One key factor that contributes to you exercising less is the efficiency of your respiratory health. Regular exercise can improve your fitness by strengthening these respiratory muscles as these are the muscles that aid you in breathing. Not only will regular exercise strengthen your muscles, your lungs will also change to increase your endurance and energy production.

Exercising to increase the strength of your respiratory muscles is beneficiary to you as you are then able to increase your respiratory volumes. it is these volumes that...

Ian Locke, founder of Thrive Personal Training in Swindon, provides personal training in a private gym as well as nutritional analysis to help clients reach their health and fitness goals.

Here he talks about how and why he came to use the POWERbreathe inspiratory muscle training device, and shares his first experience of using it. In future reports we’ll learn of his progress, so please keep coming back to check on how Ian’s breathing training is going on his POWERbreathe K5...

"As someone who has tried their hand at running, high intensity interval training, boxing and playing a wind instrument, I’ve become more conscious in recent months that the limiting...

In general, the human organism was not designed to breathe deeply at all times and in all situations. The depth of our breath, whether it is shallow, medium, or deep depends in large part on what it is we are doing. If we are sitting quietly reading, for example, we do not need to be breathing deeply. If we are working hard and expending a great deal of energy, however, we might well need to breathe deeply. Another situation in which deep breathing can be beneficial is when we are trying to revitalise our energy.

Deep breathing can be important to both health and spiritual development. Such breathing can increase our vitality and promote relaxation. Unfortunately, when we...

I realise that I haven't updated my PB Blog in a while, having had a really disappointing run in London, I took a few weeks off training. However, after a few days I was chomping at the bit to make myself even better and I have taken this new enthusiasm into my training over the last month and a bit and really enjoying running again.

After any big race, especially the marathon, you always feel a bit flat and it takes time to get back into your running, The first 2 - 3 weeks when I come back from marathon training are some of the most horrible running weeks I ever have. Whereas before the marathon you feel like you are floating on air, the legs just feel heavy...

Breathing is one of the most important things we do on a daily basis to help us live well each and every day. If we don’t breathe our organs will not receive the vital supply of oxygen required to help us live. Breathing also has a second function, it also helps to rid the body of toxins and waste products.

Oxygen is the most vital nutrient for our bodies and is essential for the brain, nerves, glands and all the internal organs.  We can go many days without food and water but with no oxygen supply we will die in a matter of minutes. The brain is the organ which requires more oxygen than any other organ. A lack of oxygen can cause mental sluggishness, negative...

The Keswick festival was very busy and had something for everyone.

There were talks by celebrities such as Chris Bonnington, Helen Skelton, Monty Hall etc. which took place in a meeting room in the town.

Talks also took place in a giant wigwam on the outdoor site where we had our stand.  I did two POWERbreathe talks, one on Friday and one on Sunday.  Both went well and led to sales.  One couple said that they had cycled 5 miles just to hear me and bought a POWERbreathe.  Most people would cycle 5 miles just to get away from me talking!!

We spread the word quite widely about POWERbreathe, as there were people from...

Anyone who participates in sports is extremely active. Competitive sports people are so concerned and focused on winning they tend to become nervous, tense and unable to get into the ‘zone’ ready for competing in the game.

If you are getting wound up like a coil then you should be checking your breath. Are you experiencing short and fast breaths? If, so then your thoughts and ability to stay calm and focused have been affected.

Throughout the day you should always do a ‘breath test’. Is your breathing calm and smooth when you expect it to be? If it isn’t then the following technique should help you.  Inhale and exhale through your nose. While doing this close...