Running

Breathing Effort in Running

When you run, your breathing muscles not only enable you to breathe, but they also work at stabilising your upper body, especially during your foot strike. This is one of the reasons that synchronising your breathing to your running cadence is more efficient, and more comfortable, because it prevents the stabilising and breathing functions of your breathing muscles from competing.

Inspiratory Muscle Training:

• Accelerated recovery during repeated sprints by up to 7% 
• Improved inspiratory muscle strength by 31.2% 
• Improved inspiratory muscle endurance by 27.8% 
• Reduced whole body effort during exercise 
• Improved performance within 4-weeks (following tried & tested training regimen)

• Breathing Training

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  • The work of breathing during running can be substantial and there have been many reports in the sport science literature of breathing muscle fatigue following events such as marathons, as well as shorter, more intense bouts of running. 

    Fatigue of any muscle makes the activity associated with that muscle feel harder – in the case of breathing, the fatigue occurs almost exclusively in the inspiratory muscles (those used to inhale) and results in laboured, uncomfortable breathing and intense breathlessness. In addition, research has shown that fatigue of the breathing muscles may result in diversion of blood away from the leg muscles. This means that the supply of oxygen to the legs is reduced and your performance is impaired. 

    Disciplined breathing technique will improve breathing comfort during running, and POWERbreathe training specifically targets the breathing muscles, strengthening them by around 30-50%, significantly improving running performance and helping to eliminate breathing fatigue.

• Warm-up with POWERbreathe for Running

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    A POWERbreathe warm-up boosts your inspiratory muscle performance. 

    Research has shown that a standard pre-exercise warm-up routine fails to prepare the inspiratory muscles (breathing muscles) for the rigours of exercise¹, and an inspiratory warm-up was shown to improve performance (in rowers)².  

    ¹ Specific respiratory warm-up improves rowing performance and exertional dyspnoea.

    ² Inspiratory muscle training improves rowing performance.

    More about POWERbreathe for warm-up can be found in our sports Training section.

• Cool-down & recover with POWERbreathe for Running

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    A POWERbreathe ‘cool-down’ can help to speed lactate clearance even more effectively than traditional active recovery strategies, helping you recover more rapidly and avoid breathing muscle fatigue.

    Researchers at the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil have found that breathing against a small inspiratory load immediately after exercise reduces lactate by 16%.¹ What’s more, unlike a normal active recovery, which takes around five minutes to speed-up lactate clearance, inspiratory loading reduces lactate as soon as exercise stops. Furthermore, when using the inspiratory load, lactate concentration after just 5 minutes was equivalent to that achieved in 15 minutes during passive recovery. 

    ¹ Blood lactate during recovery from intense exercise: impact of inspiratory loading.

    More about POWERbreathe for cool-down can be found in our sports Training section.

• Interval Training with POWERbreathe for Running

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    Integrating POWERbreathe into your interval training will improve your respiratory endurance and hasten recovery. 

    More about POWERbreathe interval training can be found in our sports Training section.

• Resources

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  • How Training the Inspiratory Muscles can Improve Running Performance  

    Running: POWERbreathe Training Protocols 

• Research

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    Inspiratory Muscle Training

    • Entraînement de la force des muscles inspiratoires chez le sujet sportif amateur (Inspiratory muscles strength training in recreational athletes)
    • Inspiratory muscle warm-up and inspiratory muscle training: Separate and combined effects on intermittent running to exhaustion
    • Inspiratory muscle training enhances pulmonary O2 uptake kinetics and high-intensity exercise tolerance in humans
    • The influence of respiratory muscle training upon intermittent exercise performance.
    • Oxygen uptake kinetics and maximal aerobic power are unaffected by inspiratory muscle training in healthy subjects where time to exhaustion is extended.
    • Inspiratory muscle training improves shuttle run performance in healthy subjects.
    • Concurrent inspiratory muscle and cardiovascular training differentially improves both perceptions of effort and 5000-m running performance compared to cardiovascular training alone.
    • The effect of inspiratory muscle training on high-intensity, intermittent running performance to exhaustion. 

    Warm-up and Cool-down

    • Inspiratory resistive loading after all-out exercise improves subsequent performance.
    • Effect of specific inspiratory muscle warm-up on intense intermittent run to exhaustion.
    • Blood lactate during recovery from intense exercise: impact of inspiratory loading.
    • Inspiratory muscle training reduces blood lactate concentration during volitional hyperpnoea.

    Exercise-induced Inspiratory Muscle Fatigue

    • Changes in respiratory muscle and lung function following marathon running in man.
    • Influence of environmental temperature on exercise-induced inspiratory muscle fatigue.
    • Aerobic fitness effects on exercise-induced low-frequency diaphragm fatigue.
    • Exercise-induced diaphragmatic fatigue in healthy humans.
    • The effect of exercise modality on respiratory muscle performance in triathletes.
    • A comparison of inspiratory muscle fatigue following maximal exercise in moderately trained males and females.
    • Inspiratory muscles experience fatigue faster than the calf muscles during treadmill marching.

    Miscellaneous

    • Development of respiratory muscle contractile fatigue in the course of hyperpnoea.
    • Inspiratory muscle training attenuates the human respiratory muscle metaboreflex.
    • Development and evaluation of a pressure threshold inspiratory muscle trainer for use in the context of sports performance.
    • Specificity and reversibility of inspiratory muscle training.
    • Inspiratory muscle training: a simple cost-effective treatment for inspiratory stridor.

    Review Articles

    • Effects of respiratory muscle training on performance in athletes: a systematic review with meta-analyses
    • Effect of Respiratory Muscle Training on Exercise Performance in Healthy Individuals: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.
      Inspiratory muscle training and endurance: a central metabolic control perspective.
    • Does training of respiratory muscles affect exercise performance in healthy subjects?
    • Respiratory muscle energetics during exercise in healthy subjects and patients with COPD.
    • Respiratory muscle training in healthy humans: resolving the controversy.