Breathing Strategies To Enhance Running Performance
by Doug Stewart
(How) can the limit of physical performance be pushed by improved breathing?
Most runners have experienced exercise-induced breathlessness or dyspnoea, especially when pushing hard. It can be unpleasant if not uncomfortable, it can lead to unfavourable psychological states and it can make athletes need to slow down or even interrupt their running.
The different reasons why breathing limits physical performance during exercise are well studied (e.g., Dempsey et al., 2020); however, few studies have explored how to address these or directly enhance breathing during exercise.
At rest, breathing exercises like slow, deep breathing have been shown to be a good remedy against dyspnoea, but it is unknown if they can be utilised during exercise to improve performance or address respiratory issues.
A recently published paper by Harbour et al, 2022 looked at the many sources that point to the possibility of improving various breathing-related features through deliberate actions. The researchers attempted to combine discoveries from exercise physiology and sports science along with anecdotal information from yoga, meditation, and breathwork. They came up with a new theoretical framework called "Breath Tools" that suggests breathing techniques to use while running to increase tolerance, performance, and remove obstacles to long-term enjoyment.
I found the following 4 tools potentially applicable for day-to-day running, because they are relatively risk free, do not need any special equipment and are not especially difficult to perform:
Paced breathing: a slower breathing rate may decrease perceived feelings of effort at a given exercise intensity. It also may improve mental performance and calmness. This strategy is most appropriate at low relative exercise intensities, as at higher intensity efforts runners will not be able to deliberately reduce the breathing rate.
Augmented breathing depth: conscious diaphragmatic deep breathing exercises can be effective for improving exercise capacity as they can lead to reduced risk for exercise-induced dyspnoea and its negative psychophysiological consequences.
Utilising nasal breathing: nasal breathing during exercise may cause – amongst others – a reduced breathing rate (Damm et al., 2018). Some studies showed favourable performance effects such as decreased respiratory exchange ratio, augmented VO2max, increased running economy and longer time to exhaustion (Recinto et al., 2017). However, they also found that nasal breathing significantly increased heart rate, suggesting greater cardiovascular stress. The authors estimate that these effects might beneficially decrease RPE or dyspnoeic sensations, but this may be offset with higher heart rate so this one is may be the least beneficial (if at all) of them.
Active Exhale: Longer exhales may cause improved Heart Rate Variability, better ventilatory efficiency and better VO2max during exercise. Also, the mountaineering community has been using active exhales for managing respiratory distress at altitude for decades. The researchers suggest that effects from applying active exhale techniques benefit running performance too.
The authors conclude that more work is needed to clarify if, how and when breathing pattern changes and which conditions facilitate this. They also state that there may be a switching point when the mental effort to change the breathing pattern decreases, perhaps unlocking resulting benefits.
So, in conclusion, it is fair to say that deliberate breathing techniques can enhance running performance. While these effects are not immediate, the authors suggest that exercise performance may be increased by 1% to 5% over a longer learning period (2-6 months).
The benefits of using these strategies are highest for people with low respiratory capacity. The greatest advantages seem psychological and increased exercise tolerance or positive psychological states might increase runners’ exercise habits and long-term training adherence.
References:
Harbour E, Stöggl T, Schwameder H, Finkenzeller T. Breath Tools: A Synthesis of Evidence-Based Breathing Strategies to Enhance Human Running. Front Physiol. 2022 Mar 17;13:813243. doi: 10.3389/fphys.2022.813243. PMID: 35370762; PMCID: PMC8967998.
Dempsey, J. A., La Gerche, A., and Hull, J. H. (2020). Is the healthy respiratory system built just right, overbuilt, or underbuilt to meet the demands imposed by exercise? J. Appl. Physiol. 129, 1235–1256. doi: 10.1152/japplphysiol.00444.2020
Damm, L., Varoqui, D., De Cock, V. C., Dalla Bella, S., and Bardy, B. (2020). Why do we move to the beat? A multi-scale approach, from physical principles to brain dynamics. Neurosci. Biobehav. Rev. 112, 553–584. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2019.12.024
Recinto, C., Efthemeou, T., Boffelli, P. T., and Navalta, J. W. (2017). Effects of nasal or oral breathing on anaerobic power output and metabolic responses. Int. J. Exerc. Sci. 10, 506–514.