Breathing fully properly and deeply is important in helping you reach your fitness goals. It has an effect on your workout and also how you feel during exercise. Proper breathing during weight training exercises can help you lift more comfortably and make exercises more efficient.
Breathing is a natural and involuntary process. The breathing process is divided into two phases:
- Inhalation: Lung receives air and gas exchange occurs.
- Exhalation: The air filled with carbon dioxide is exhaled outside the body.
A lot of beginner weight trainers neglect proper breathing during weight training. Proper breathing during weight lifting is of utmost importance because it helps oxygenate hard-working muscles and supplies them with nutrient-rich blood. Improper Breathing or not breathing at all, on the other hand, will make you dizzy and exhausted. It is associated to other problems as well like:
- Headaches,
- Nausea,
- Heart attack,
- Hernia,
- Glaucoma etc.
Why is it important to breath during Weight Lifting?
During Exercising, waste products are formed which are required to be pumped out by the heart. So the lungs have to work much harder. Thus it is very important that one should never reach the stage of complete breathlessness. This may result in giddiness or causing one to faint. It can also increase your blood pressure and stress your heart.
Plus there are added advantages if you breathe properly like:
- You will be able to burn more fat.
- You will be able to lift more.
- It will help prevent injury (holding your breath increases the pressure in your abdominal cavity which helps support your back).
How do I breathe correctly?
Here is a step by step guide to help you with the same:
- First and foremost, don't use excessive weights.
- Never hold your breathe. One common mistake that the beginner weight trainers most often make is to hold their breath while lifting, most often referred to as the Valsalva Maneuver. The combination of breath-holding mixed with lifting weights puts your health and safety at risk. It causes your blood pressure to rise higher and puts unnecessary stress on your heart.
- Take a couple of deep breaths before performing the set. Force the supply of oxygen to your brain and muscles.
- Put initial pressure against the weight and exhale slowly. Make it atleast last for the duration of the muscle contraction.
- Exhale on the exertion or most difficult part of the exercise like pulling, curling etc and inhale on the recovery (easiest part of the exercise) like releasing. For example, when you are pushing a bench press off your chest, you exhale on the push and inhale as you bring it slowly to your chest. When you are working on the lateral pulley, you exhale on the pulling down and inhale on the way up.
- Exhale through your mouth and inhale through your nose.
- Concentrate on your breathing as you do each rep. Try to make each breath steady and calm. Breathing too fast or too slow can make you hyperventilate or dizzy.
- Always control the intake of breath, keeping it smooth and deep. This will prevent gulping air which in turn regulates the oxygen levels in your blood.
- Breathe from your belly or diaphragm, not your chest. When you breathe through your chest, only a small volume of air is drawn in which results in your energy levels plummeting. When you breathe through your belly, it pulls the bottom of the lungs downward, causing them to fill and the belly to lift.
- When you exhale, it is perfectly fine to "puff" if you are contracting your muscles quickly.
- At the end of a training session, do a few breathing exercises as it will help to bring about a slowing down of the flow of blood.
Breathing during lifting will give you more power and help you perform more reps in every set. To perfect your breathing technique, you should try learning yoga breathing principles. It will help you make your breathe more steady and calm.
Nice article.