POWERbreathe – Improves Running Performance

• Accelerated recovery during repeated sprints by up to 7%
• Increased strength of inspiratory muscles by 30 – 50%
• Reduced whole body effort during exercise
• Improved performance within 4-weeks (following tried & tested training regimen)

POWERbreathe Inspiratory Muscle Training & Running

You might think that breathing whilst you’re running was a piece of cake compared to a sport like swimming, but holding your upper body upright whilst it’s moving through the air and landing unpredictably with each foot fall is hard work.

“When we are running, the breathing muscles are not only enabling us to breathe, they are also working to stabilise the upper body (especially during the foot strike when large destabilising forces are transmitted up the body)”, explains sports scientist and respiratory physiologist Dr Alison McConnell. “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”.

The work of breathing during exercise 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, recent 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 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.

Train smarter, not harder, to perform better.

Resources:

• Running: POWERbreathe Training Protocols - COMING SOON!

• How Training The Inspiratory Muscles Can Improve Running Performance 

Research:

Links to research papers, published in peer-reviewed, high quality scientific journals. As well as original studies, we have also included some articles that review IMT; these have been written by experts in this field of research.

Inspiratory Muscle Training

• 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

• 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.