Tag Archives: breathing exercises

So, 2013 is the year for Breathing Big! Well, all you POWERbreathe users are one-step ahead in setting the trend for improving your breathing strength and breathing pattern. You’ll already be familiar with the benefits that inspiratory muscle training has on your breathing and ultimately your sports performance, or if you have breathing difficulties, on your quality of life.

We’ve heard from the US that Breathing Big is going to be making its mark in 2013, with “fitness professionals taking more credence in assessing breathing patterns in their clients”.

“While we’re just scratching the tip of the iceberg in this regard, it’s profound how much of an effect faulty...

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...

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease also known as COPD is the term that is given to a group of lung diseases. these lung diseases block your airflow as you exhale, making it very difficult for you to breathe.  Practising regular breathing exercises can help you cope with COPD and also aid your COPD treatment.  Worldwide COPD is a major cause of death.

If you have COPD then the most effective way to overcome breathlessness is to relax and breathe. Find a quiet spot and lay down in a comfortable position completely focus on your breathing.  With each breathe that you take you should try and slow down the pace and relax...

Singing is all about having a good technique. Like any other sport you can train yourself to become better at it. How do you do this? Simple, you need to use various breathing techniques related to singing which help you exercise and train your lungs, vocal chords, diaphragm and help you with breath control to enable you to make your voice more powerful which means you can hold notes for much longer.

Before using any breathing techniques to help your singing you first need to learn some basic breathing techniques to help you breathe normally. These basics will teach you how the lungs, diaphragm and trachea all work together to help you breathe.

When you...

Inspiratory muscle training also known as IMT is a regimen of breathing exercises that aims to strengthen the respiratory muscles in our body to make it easier for us to breathe comfortably. IMT can be used specifically for patients who suffer from any form of respiratory illness including emphysema, bronchitis, asthma, dyspnoea, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) or any other breathing illness.

These types of illnesses have been shown to weaken and even deteriorate muscle bulk, including the muscles of the respiratory system, thereby depriving the body of necessary oxygen. This training is designed to strengthen and rebuild those...

One of the foundations of learning to sing correctly is knowing how to breathe correctly as well as learning how to correctly control the way you breathe so that when you are singing your breathing is being used to optimum effect.

As soon as we are born our breathing is naturally correct. A baby can breathe, yell and scream at optimum capacity because they are using their lungs without any conscious thought. However, as we grow older some people become lazy in how they breathe and breathe using only the upper part of their lungs – taking a shallow breath instead of a normal breath.

Understanding how to correctly breathe and use breath control,...

The One Show recently included a feature on breath control for singers. Presented by Carrie Grant, British vocal coach and session singer, the feature began – and ended - with two extraordinary facts: the longest note in UK chart history is held by Morten Harket from Aha who held a note for 20-seconds, in ‘Summer Moved On’. This record is followed by Bill Withers who held a note for 18-seconds in his song ‘Lovely Day’.

How do they do it? Is lung capacity the key?

Could lung capacity be the reason why one person is able to hold a note longer than another person? Does this have an impact on the length...

Exercising on a regular basis is critical for fitness. Regular aerobic exercise is essential for cardiovascular fitness as the exercise reduces the amount of work the lungs need to do. However, you cannot increase your lung capacity with regular exercise and if you suffer from lung disorders such as COPD, asthma or emphysema regular exercise will not improve lung function.

Regular physical activity will help strengthen your limb muscles  and help to reduce shortness of breath symptoms and increase your stamina.

The respiratory system is made up of the nose,...

I am using my new Powerbreathe Fitness Plus and it is a great help with my fitness training.  There is a Gym nearby which is a great help; various classes are available and good equipment to use, which is all helping my training schedule.  I am also cycling, so things are going O.K.

Looking back, my love of cycling has helped me remain fairly fit for someone who has had asthma since I was 2 years old, (I am now 74!!!) and it is this interest in cycling that lead me to discover Powerbreathe!

Mary (my wife) and I were out collecting shoeboxes for Link Romania and were headed for North Devon.  As we approached...

Recently our Duncan was on yet another trip abroad, lucky him getting to go on all these 'jolly boy's outings' while we slave away at POWERbreathe HQ.

Anyway, joking aside it is all work really......

Duncan's last trip was to Slovenia to go and see the POWERbreathe Distributor    In Tact Group.  Whilst there he was introduced to Martin Strel AKA known as Big River Man. Martin Strel is a legendary Guinness record marathon swimmer, who has always been looking for the challenges of impossible and the Amazon was the recent one. On April 7th, 2007 Martin Strel completed his epic Amazon river swim all the way...