Breathing Techniques for Running Long Distance
Breathing Techniques for Running Long Distance: changing the way you breathe could be the key to running longer with less effort. As you begin to reach your aerobic threshold your lungs have a tendency to go into overdrive tipping you into your anaerobic metabolism which cannot be sustained for long. This results in either an eventual slow down or total stop. Your breathing becomes shallower, less controlled, and you experience shortness of breath. However, developing breathing techniques and practicing breathing exercises that strengthen your respiratory muscles can help you maintain deeper, more controlled and easier breathing resulting in a greater aerobic threshold and ultimately improving your stamina/ability to run longer.
Many runners focus on their athletic training, and heart rate completely overlooking the importance of lung capacity when it comes to endurance as well as overall cardiovascular health. Essentially better breathing results in more oxygen getting to your muscles and improved endurance. To improve your breathing you can focus on functional breathing techniques to practice during your running training, as well as breathing exercises to practice a few times a week or even daily if you can remember to carve out a few extra minutes a day to focus on your breath.
Rhythmic breathing is a great technique to use while running as it not only encourages deeper breathing that improves your endurance, it also helps prevent injury. Running can be very tough on your joints the greatest stress to your body occurs when your foot hits the ground at the beginning of an exhalation on the same side. Rhythmic breathing coordinates foot strike on an odd even pattern so that you will alternate landing on your right and left foot and the beginning of an exhalation so that the shock is absorbed evenly by both sides of the body. To start applying rhythmic breathing to your running inhale for the first three steps, then exhale for the next two steps. You should inhale and exhale smoothly and continuously through both your nose and your mouth.
Another step you can take to improve your stamina and go a greater distance on your runs is to practice breathing exercises that will strengthen your respiratory muscles enabling you to inhale a greater volume of oxygen and exhale a greater volume of carbon dioxide. This will help you breathe easier throughout your run and increase your aerobic threshold. Using a breathing resistance trainer like Expand-A-Lung is an easy way to train your respiratory muscles in less than a few minutes daily. This device provides inspiratory and expiratory resistance which strengthens your diaphragm as well as your intercostal muscles. The result is deeper easier breathing, and improved endurance.
Additionally you can practice some Pilates exercises like the hundred, the swan, and the standing chest expansion. These three exercises combined will help you control your breath, open the chest and increase your lung capacity, as well as stretch the intercostal muscles.
