Breathe Strong App available at the iTunes Store

This week saw the launch of the first Breathe Strong App in the iTunes Store.

If you’re an existing subscriber to my Blog, you’ve visited www.breathstrong.com, you bought my book (thanks!), or you use a POWERbreathe®, you already know that breathing training is quickest and easiest way to improve your performance, and reduce perceived exertion.

The new Breathe Strong App provides a comprehensive, but convenient guide to optimising your breathing training. It’s packed with information and tips, and also provides a user programmable breathing pacer and counter. This function can not only be used to optimise your breathing training, but can also help you build breathing control during other workouts. Use the pacer to regulate your breathing during the workout to build good breathing habits - replace all that “puffing and panting” with deep, slow, controlled breathing.

The new App also provides some of my “top tips”, drawn from 20 years of research, and over 15 years of working in elite sport.

The App is priced at just £1.49, and gives you access to the following secrets of optimal breathing training on your iPhone or iPad –  

·      Optimal breathing technique

·      Setting the training load

·      Optimising repetition failure

·      The influence of concurrent training

·      Progressing training

·      The Prof’s  ‘Top Tips’

Just visit the iTunes App store and search using "Breathe Strong". Please feel free to post your comments about the App here, and we'll do our best to incorporate your suggestions in future updates.

The launch of the Android version will be announced within the next few weeks.

Anaerobics and HIT - the truth about "fat burning" exercise

For my latest Blog post, I decided to pontificate about something other than breathing for a change. The decision was prompted by a peak of irritation that I experienced recently. What or who was I irritated with? “fitness journalists” – not all of them, just the ones who persist in propogating the myth that the key to “fat burning” is low intensity exercise. The REALLY irritating part is that the people doing this should know better, and they do their readers and clients a disservice with their misinterpretation and misundertaning of the science.

The fat burning myth

The fat buring myth goes like this – it claims there’s an optimal exercise intentisty at which you “burn fat” during exercise, thereby reducing your fat stores. The assumption is that exercising at this intensity will optimise your fat loss. The damaging part is that this fat burning silver bullet is low intensity exercise. It’s damaging because it means that millions of people are being misled; they are being directed towards an activity that requires fewer calories and is counter-productive if their objective is to lose fat.

I want to explode the fat burning myth, and to offer an alternative, more effective way to lose fat – I once called it "Anaerobics", but it’s become known as high-intensity-training (HIT). A version of this article was published in 2002 in SportEX Medicine, so in a way, this is very old news, but I think it’s worth repeating, because no one seemed to listen first time around.

Aerobic, anaerobic…what does it all mean?

In the 1980s Jane Fonda brought us “aerobics”, a word that is now firmly entrenched in our popular culture. In the context of exercise and metabolism, the term “aerobic” relates to activity that relies upon energy supplied by oxygen-driven metabolic pathways. Energy can also be produced by “anaerobic” metabolism, which provides energy for short periods of time using metabolic pathways that do not require oxygen.

One factor that distinguishes the two pathways is the rate at which each can supply energy, which in turn determines the intensity at which exercise can be undertaken using each of the pathways:

• Aerobic metabolism - can only sustain light to moderate intensity exercise, above this intensity
• Anaerobic metabolism - supplements the aerobic energy production, or may even supply all of the energy (eg. a 100m sprint).

Fat as a source of energy (calories)

The utilisation of fat as a fuel for energy production is complex, but around 95% of the energy liberation from fat occurs in the cell mitochondia, and requires a process called oxidation, i.e., aerobic metabolism. It’s believed that the eventual balance between carbohydrate and fat usage during exercise is determined by the rate of carbohydrate usage. During higher intensity exercise, there is a strong stimulus for use of carbohydrate - muscle glycogen to be broken down by a process called glycolysis to produce a substance called pyruvate. Pyruvate competes with fatty acids for entry into the mitochondria where oxidation takes place (1). Thus, fat oxidation only predominates during low intensity exercise, when there is less pyruvate to compete for entry into the mitochondria.

However, this insight has led to a crucial misconception about how fat stores are reduced by exercise, i.e., people believe that it’s only possible to lose fat during low-to-moderate intensity exercise. The crux of this misconception is the erroneous assumption that fat can only be lost if it is the primary fuel source during exercise. This myth is one that I, as an exercise scientist, feel compelled to explode, because the scientific basis for this simply does not add up.

Why fat burning exercise is a myth

Human metabolism must obey the laws of physics, the most relevant of which relates to the conservation of energy – “energy cannot be created or destroyed, only transformed from one form to another”. This means that the energy budget must balance, irrespective of the fuel source. In other words, if you run 5km, the energy required to do this is the same whether you use fat stores (muscle triglyceride stores and adipose tissue) or carbohydrate stores (muscle and liver glycogen and glucose), or a combination of the two.

The amount of fat lost during exercise is determined by the total calorie expenditure and not by the fuel source. This is because:

• If glycogen stores have been depleted, subsequent physical activity must resort to fat as a fuel for oxidation.
• Carbohydrate stores can be replenished by both the carbohydrate that we eat, and by the breakdown of our fat stores (lypolysis).

Not all stored fat can be converted to glucose, but the glycerol portion of stored triglyceride can, and this “gluconeogenesis” is an important role for glycerol when glycogen reserves are depleted. However, this gluconeogenic role of glycerol will only occur if glycogen stores are not immediately and fully replenished by the consumption of dietary carbohydrate – to lose fat you need to be in a state of “negative energy balance” -  expending more calories than you consume. This applies equally whether you use fat as a source of fuel for exercise, or carbohydrate. So you see, it doesn’t matter where the calories come from, if you want to lose fat, what matters is that you expend more calories than you consume.

Maximising calorie expenditure

In theory, maximal calorie usage is achieved by exercising at a high intensity for very long periods of time. Unfortunately, high intensity exercise requires the use of anaerobic metabolism, which produces lactic acid, a metabolite that is very strongly linked to fatigue. So it can only be sustained for short periods of time.

So how can the calorie expending benefits of high intensity exercise be achieved without premature exhaustion and curtailment of activity? There are two approaches:

1. Having determined how long a workout is to last, say 30-minutes, the exercise intensity should be fixed as high as is possible in order to sustain exercise for 30-minutes. In other words, the exercise is undertaken above the lactate (anaerobic) threshold, but at an intensity level that produces fatigue gradually over a period of 30-minutes. As “fitness” improves, the exercise can be sustained at progressively higher intensities and more energy is expended in the same 30-minutes.
2. The second approache is to divide the workout into short, very intense bouts, with periods of recovery between each. This is known as interval training (more recently as HIT), and is explained in more detail below.

The influence of efficiency on calorie expenditure

As well as the straightforward mathematical logic that says you expend more calories during 30 minutes of running at 10kph than you do at 7kph, there is another factor that works in the favour of high intensity exercise for calorie expenditure, and that is the efficiency of movement. Human movement has an efficiency of around 26% (at best).  This is easily illustrated:

Efficiency =   External work done      x 100%

                      Total energy required

to perform the work

Efficiency example

The mechanical work done whilst exercising at 100W on a cycle for 30-minutes is equivalent to 43 kcal (net energy requirement). The total energy required to perform that work is 165 kcal (goss energy enpenditure), giving a gross efficiency of 26% (43/165 x 100%).  In other words, the human machine wastes 64% of the energy it uses, predominately in the form of heat. Unlike a car where you want to get as many miles to the gallon as you can, if you want to maximise calorie expenditure, inefficiency is good news - the less efficient you are the more calories you expend.

Efficiency during high intensity training (HIT)

Producing energy at high rates, to sustain intense exercise, is even less efficient than the pitiful 26% that human beings typically achieve during low intensity exercise.  Whilst this fact has been known for many years, it appears to have been overlooked in the context of maximising “fat burning”.  A 1978 study (2) identified that the efficiency of high intensity work was only 10-15%. This reduction in mechanical efficiency with increasing intensity of work is not fully understood, but is likely to be due to a combination of factors.  These include the contribution made by lactate to energy production, decreases in muscle efficiency and increases in energy expenditure from muscles not directly involved in the locomotor activity (eg. trunk stabilisers, respiratory muscles, cardiac muscle).

Sprinting and weight training are low efficiency activities because they also involved rapid, repeated contractions and relaxations of large muscle masses.  This type of intermittent activity requires more energy than slow, sustained contractions because the actual contraction and relaxation phases of the movement add to the overall energy expenditure (3). Researchers have shown that high intensity interval training has much to offer those interested in weight management (4). All this tends to point to high intensity training (HIT) as the “way to go” for maximising calorie expenditure. There’s also been a lot of recent interst in the benefits of HIT from a health perspective (http://tinyurl.com/6vg2wx5), but that’s another blog post…

Of course, the problem with HIT is that you cannot sustain exercise for more than a few minutes, or seconds, at a time - precisely how long you can tolerate it will depend upon just how intense the exercise is, how fit you are, and how long you are prepared to tolerate the discomfort. This is where the interval approach comes into its own - you exercise hard for a few minutes (or even seconds) and then rest or take an active recovery at a low intensity. Let’s find out a bit more about the benefits of HIT for fat loss.

Interval training…the new fat burning exercise

Interval training normally consists of a series of short duration high intensity bouts of work interspersed with short recovery periods (normally in the ratio 1:1). The recovery period can be either passive or active.

Let’s consider the theoretical energy requirements of a series of one minute intervals of high intensity exercise with one minute of rest between bouts. Each interval might have an energy expenditure of as much as 36 kcal. So our series of four one minute bouts of high intensity exercise could have an energy expenditure (4 x 36 kcal = 144 kcal) that is almost equivalent to 30 minutes of moderate intensity exercise as illustrated by the earlier calculation of expending 165 kcal after cycling for 30 minutes. In theory, you could expend an equivalent number of calories to 30 minutes low-to-moderate intensity cycling in less than 10 minutes of interval training. Or to look at it another way, you could expend three times the number of calories in the same 30 minute visit to the gym. This concept of high intensity exercise having low efficiency is supported by a study (5) that compared the total energy cost of exercise for two theoretically energy equivalent tasks, one of moderate intensity, the other maximal. The first task was a 3.5 minute treadmill walk, the second was a series of three 15 second sprints.  When the actual energy requirements were measured the walk required 39 kcal and the sprints required 65 kcal.

Weight training…the other new fat burning exercise

Weight training can also expend calories very effectively. For example, bench-pressing 30kg for 3 sets of 8 reps has a total gross energy expenditure equivalent to around 25 kcal (assuming gross efficiency of 10%).  Those 25 kcal would take you less than 5-minutes to expend (each set would take around 20-seconds to complete, with 2 periods of 2-minutes rest between each set). The added benefit of weight training is that it also increases muscle mass and raises the basal energy requirements, which means that you expend more calories each 24 hours, even if you’re doing nothing. There is also an acute “calorie burning hangover” from weight training, which has been confirmed empirically in a study showing that up to 16 hours post-training, metabolic rate was 4.2% higher than before the training session, and that there was also a higher level of fat oxidation (6). In other words, weight training elevates post-exercise metabolic rate.

Take care

Clearly, interval and heavy resistance training are not something that can be embarked upon immediately, or by everyone; you need a progressive approach to intensity, and you need to ensure that you are medically fit for HIT.

Furthermore, HIT should form part of a balanced programme of activities that includes some low intensity endurance training. The latter provides a greater stimulus to increasing muscle aerobic capacity, raising the intensity at which fat oxidation can predominate, as well as reducing cardiovascular risk factors.

Take home message

So to summarise, if we compare the energy expended during the active phases of the 3 workout examples given above (excluding time taken for rest periods between intervals or sets) we can easily see the advantages of anaerobic, high intensity exercise for fat loss:

Moderate constant intensity exercise      5.5 kcal per minute

Weight training                                             25 kcal per minute

High intensity intervals                               36 kcal per minute

So now you know the truth about fat burning - the next person who tells you that you need to exercise at low-to-moderate intensities to lose body fat simply doesn’t understand metabolism. You should view their advice with the same scepticism as this old cigarette advert, which claims that smoking is the route to weight loss and a healthy, active lifestyle –

 Thanks to http://tinyurl.com/5gre9m for the image.

References

1. Wolfe. Fat metabolism in exercise. Advances in Experimental Biology.  441: 147-56, 1998).
2. Gladden & Welch. Efficiency of anaerobic work. Journal of Applied Physiology 44:564-70. 1978.
3. Pahud et al. Energy expended during oxygen deficit period of submaximal exercise in man. Journal of applied Physiology 48:770-5, 1980).
4. Hunter et al. A role for high intensity exercise in energy balance and weight control. Int. J. Relat. Metab. Disord. 22: 489-93, 1998).
5. Scott. Interpreting energy expenditure for anaerobic exercise and recovery: an anaerobic hypothesis. Journal of Sports Medicine & Physical Fitness 37: 18-23, 1997.
6. Osterberg and Melby, Effect of acute resistance exercise on postexercise oxygen consumption and resting metabolic rate in young women. Int J. Sport Nutr. Exerc. Metab. 10: 71-81, 2000.

Presentation at the ExCel London Bike Show 14th January 2012

I'm giving a one hour presentation at the forthcoming London Bike Show on Saturday 14th January at 10.30am. The talk will be an extended version of the shorter presentation that I gave at the NEC Cycle Show in Septmeber last year, and will include additional material from my November Webinar.

Check out my September Blog post ("Breathe Strong in the Saddle") for information on the talk.

You can also come any meet me at at the BikeRadar Training Hub after the talk.

If it ain’t broke don’t fix it?

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You can obtain more information about breathing training at www.breathestrong.com, where you can also find out about my comprehensive guide to breathing and exercise “Breathe Strong, Perform Better” (published by Human Kinetics Inc.). Scroll to the bottom of this page to visit the ‘Breathe Strong’ Amazon store.

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As a scientist, I feel a duty to exploit new knowledge to drive innovation, and in doing so, to make things better. So when someone tells me that, “the POWERbreathe works perfectly well”, and cautions me, “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”, my natural response is to say, “it’s good, but it could be even better”.

In this Blog I thought I’d share with you some of the scientific insights that led to the development and launch of one of the most exciting new training products to hit the market in a very long time…the POWERbreathe® K-Series. (but then I would say that, wouldn’t I?)

The birth of POWERbreathe®

When I first conceived the idea for the POWERbreathe® in the late 1980s, we knew comparatively little about how to train the breathing muscles. However, what was abundantly clear was that the devices that preceded POWERbreathe® didn’t work very well. Early products were very crude; they generated training loads using simple, static flow resistors, which were akin to breathing through a straw. In other words, they made breathing harder by passing inhaled air through small holes with fixed diameters. This type of breathing training is known as inspiratory flow resistive loading (IFRL) and typical training products allow users to select from a range of different sized holes that occlude the inspiratory port of the device. In theory, for a given rate of inhalation, the smaller the orifice, the greater the load to breathing. In practice, the training load doesn’t just vary with the size of the hole, it also varies with the rate of airflow; the faster one breathes through a given hole, the harder it is to inhale, and vice versa for slow inhalation. This makes IFRL is a bit like pulling a trolley loaded with passengers who keep jumping on and off the trolley; the load is never constant, or predictable. For this reason, IFRL fell out of fashion, and whilst some IFRL products still persist in the market, the primary reason for their continued existence is their low manufacturing cost, because their efficacy is highly questionable.

So, at the time that I undertook my first breathing training studies, there was nothing in the market that met my need for a device that delivered an effective training stimulus to the inspiratory muscles. Without any commercialisation agenda (see Blog 1), I therefore set about creating a training device that would provide that most important requirement for any device that is to be used to train muscles - a reliable load. The resulting device was a little “Heath Robinson”, but it imposed a reliable inspiratory resistance using a spring-loaded valve, and became the precursor to the mechanical POWERbreathe® range.

The drive to optimise

As knowledge and understanding of the inspiratory muscles increased, it became apparent (to me at least) that the inherent characteristics of the load provided by the mechanical POWERbreathe® were not optimised. Why so you might ask, surely all you need is a reliable load, a suitable training regimen, and the muscles will do the rest? That’s true up to a point, but effective is not the same as optimal, and I wanted optimal. In order to understand my discontentment with the loading provided by the mechanical POWERbreathe®, it is necessary to delve into some fundamental muscle physiology.

Muscles have a number of inherent properties, which if they are overlooked, can impose limitations upon their ability to adapt to training. One of the most important is the fact that the force generating capacity (strength) of muscles varies, depending upon their length. For example, the biceps is weakest when the elbow is fully extended, becomes stronger as the elbow flexes, and then becomes weaker again at full flexion. This property is known as the ‘length-tension’ relationship, and it was first described in detail by an English physiologist called A.V. Hill in the 1930s. Most modern gym weight training machines incorporate a cam system that accommodates the ‘length-tension’ properties of the muscle group being trained. This innovation makes it possible to overload muscles maximally, and also maximises the number of repetitions that can be achieved.

In the context of the breathing muscles, their ‘length-tension’ relationship determines the tension (force) they can generate at any given lung volume. Since we cannot measure the force generated by the respiratory muscles directly, the relationship is expressed as a ‘volume-pressure’ relationship. As might be predicted, the inspiratory muscles are strongest when the lungs are empty, and the expiratory muscles are strongest when they are full. But this relationship is so potent that the inspiratory and expiratory muscles have little or no pressure generating capacity at their weakest lung volumes (see Figure 1 below for the inspiratory muscles). This phenomenon is also known as “functional weakening”.

Figure 1. Strength (pressure) vs. lung volume for the inspiratory muscles. Note there is functional weakening as lung volume increases.

The practical implications of functional weakening are not obvious at first sight, but they have a profound influence on how the inspiratory muscles respond to a load of fixed intensity (like that provided by a mechanical POWERbreathe®). The problem with fixed intensity inspiratory load is that its relative intensity increases with lung volume. In other words, as the muscles become weaker throughout inhalation, the relative intensity of the load increases. For example, when the lungs are empty, and the inspiratory muscles are strong, the load might be only 50% of the maximal strength. As inhalation progresses, the muscles become functionally weaker, and this same absolute load becomes a progressively greater and greater proportion of the strength of the muscles. Finally, the load exceeds the maximal strength of the muscles at that lung volume, and inhalation must cease. This leads to a phenomenon that I call “breath clipping’.

In the Figure 2, the implications of the changing relative intensity of a fixed load are clearer.  It illustrates the interactions between inspiratory muscle strength (black line), different training loads (40%, 50%, 60% and 70% of maximal inspiratory muscle strength [coloured lines]) and the breath volume that can be achieved during training, as well as the effect of fatigue (dotted lines). For example, at a load of 40%, it is possible to inhale to around 60% of lung volume, whereas at a load of 70% it is only possible to inhale to around 35% of lung volume before the breath is clipped. This is equivalent to being restricted to the first 35 degrees of elbow flexion of a bicep curl – not very satisfactory.

Figure 2. The interactions between inspiratory muscle strength (black line), different training loads (coloured lines). The slopes on the coloured lines illustrate how the relative intensity of the load increases during inhalation.

The paradox of heavy loading

So, what are the practical implications of functional weakening and the breath clipping that results? Although muscle is a very adaptable tissue, research has shown that the adaptations elicited by inspiratory muscle training are specific to a number of characteristics of the training stimulus (Romer & McConnell, 2003 -  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12569211), including the lung volume at which training takes place. The practical implication of this is that optimal results are only achieved if inspiratory muscle training is undertaken across the full range of lung volume, i.e., from the point at which the lungs are as empty as they can be, to the point at which they are full. Failure to do this will lead to sub-optimal adaptation at some lung volumes, which may have a performance impact if these volumes are called upon during exercise. As can be seen in Figure 2, if the load is too heavy, it’s not possible to train across the full range of lung volume, and the heavier the load, the lower this range is. Furthermore, when you add fatigue into the mix, it becomes even worse.

In addition, loading too heavily can also compromise the amount of work that can be undertaken during training, which also impairs the training response. In a recently published study (McConnell & Griffiths, 2010 - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20142783), we examined the effects of various inspiratory loads upon a range of different variables, including the number of repetitions that could be tolerated, the volume of each breath during the training session, the amount of work completed during the session, and whether the session activated the inspiratory muscle metaboreflex (see Blog 2 for information about this important reflex). We studied well-trained young rowers who had not undergone any IMT previously. As expected, the number of breaths (reps) declined as load increased (e.g., just 4 breaths at 90% of maximal inspiratory muscle strength and 84 breaths at 60%), and the volume of each breath declined with increasing load, as well as during each session (because of fatigue). The most surprising finding was the influence of heavy loads (>70%) upon the amount of work that was undertaken per breath (work is equivalent to the load multiplied by the breath volume). Because the volume of each breath was lower with heavy loads, the amount of work done per breath was reduced markedly. This effect is completely counter-intuitive, because during limb muscle training, heavier loads mean more work (that’s because if you’re maintaining good form, the range of movement doesn’t change a great deal when moving from moderate to heavy loads). The detrimental effect of the reduction in breath volume upon the training stimulus delivered to the inspiratory muscles was compounded by the reduction in the number of breaths at heavy loads. In other words, the total amount of work done by the inspiratory muscles is reduced markedly by increasing the load above 70%. This finding explained some confusing results from previous, unpublished studies undertaken by two of my Masters students. In two separate studies, we noted that professional rugby players, and professional soccer players showed virtually no change in inspiratory muscle function in response to training at loads in excess of 70%. So you can have too much of a good thing!

It should be apparent by now that, although the mechanical POWERbreathe® ain’t broke (it works extremely well), it could benefit from some improvement. The optimal training device would be one that enabled heavy loading, without compromising lung volume achieved, and work done.  That was the conclusion I reached in 1997, and it sparked an ambition in me to develop the “perfect POWERbreathe®”.  Somewhat frustratingly, it has taken more than a decade to realise my original vision, but it’s finally here.

Designing the “perfect POWERbreathe®”

From the preceding paragraphs, it should be apparent that in order to deliver an optimised training load, the perfect POWERbreathe® must do the following -

1.  Promote maximal volume excursion

2. Promote maximal load setting without compromising volume

3. Maximise the amount of work undertaken during a given training session

As luck would have it, all of these requirements can be satisfied by a loading mechanism that is sympathetic to functional weakening of the breathing muscles (Figure 1). In other words, rather than maintaining the same absolute load throughout the breath, it maintains the same relative load, i.e., despite functional weakening, the load starts at 50% of the strength, and ends at 50%. To achieve this the device needs to taper the absolute load during inhalation, so that it is the same shape as Figure 1 (above).

The POWERbreathe K-Series is born…

The POWERbreathe® K-Series (PBK) does precisely what the physiology specified for the perfect POWERbreathe® - it provides a tapered load that optimises breath volume, work and tolerability during training.

The PBK design is a departure from the spring-loaded valve technology of the past, favouring instead, real-time, dynamic adjustment of a flow resistor valve. In essence, the surface area of a variable flow orifice is adjusted within each breath according to the prevailing respiratory flow rate.  It’s the world’s first dynamically adjusted flow resistance trainer, and it is the result of a long-term collaboration between POWERbreathe®, myself and colleagues at Brunel University in London.

Adjustments to the valve are made 500 per second, taking less than a millisecond to complete (see video clip 1 below). This means that, in theory, ANY pressure load profile can be imposed. In practice, a tapered load akin to that in Figure 1 is provided (see video clip 2 below). This allows for maximal volume excursion, and a considerable improvement in tolerability, which enhances the number of breaths before ‘failure’. Trials have also revealed that at loads above 50% of inspiratory muscle strength, the amount of work completed per breath is greater using the PBK than when using the mechanical POWERbreathe®. The tapered load also permits ‘heavier’ loading, improving the amount of work done per breath still further.

Video Clip 1: PBK valve adjusting at 500 times per second

The first PBK products were launched in 2010, and real-time PC connectivity via POWERbreathe®’s unique BreatheLink® software came on stream just this month. The BreatheLink® software is a revelation, even for me. You can observe key functional indices in real time as you train, which makes it possible to correct bad technique, as well as focussing on maximising key variables such as volume and airflow rate.  Even I’ve noticed how much better my technique has become over the period I’ve been test-driving the BreatheLink® software. More importantly (and remarkably), I even notice an improvement in how my breathing feels under ‘stress’, such as during interval and hill training. That’s amazing, given that I’m the longest serving member of the POWERbreathe® training club! It’s VERY addictive…see the video below for a quick peak…

Video Clip 2: BreatheLink® software providing continuous feedback during PBK training. Top left panel is the training load during each breath.

Of the many unique and innovative features offered by the PBK, its auto load setting utility is one that many users will find especially helpful. Every training session starts with two unloaded set-up breaths, during which the user must exert maximal effort to inhale as quickly and deeply as possible. These set-up breaths provide data that are used to calculate an index of inspiratory muscle function, and a measurement of lung volume. In “Automatic” mode, the former is used to automatically programme the appropriate training load; the latter is used to provide a personalised taper for the training session. This means that the loading of each and every training session is optimised to the prevailing function of the inspiratory muscles. Of course, it’s also possible to set your load manually, and with the BreatheLink® software it’s even possible to create your own training sessions, and to upload these to the PBK unit. I’ve been experimenting with some interval training sessions using this facility. Needless to say, the ability to make within and between breath adjustments makes this type of device extremely versatile from the loading perspective.

More than a decade after concluding POWERbreathe® was “good, but could be better”, I finally have my perfect POWERbreathe® - it’s taken longer than I expected, but it’s been well worth the wait – there’s virtually nothing that the PBK and BreatheLink® software cannot deliver...

        …breathing training really has become 

          “a piece of cake”.

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Look out for the FREE Breathe Strong Foundation Training App on iTunes at the end of the month.

If you found my Blog interesting, please come back for further articles and news, as well as my musings on all things breathing and sport related. Also, don’t forget that you can obtain more information about breathing training at www.breathestrong.com, where you can also find out about my comprehensive guide to breathing and exercise “Breathe Strong, Perform Better” (published by Human Kinetics Inc.). Scroll to the bottom of this page to visit the ‘Breathe Strong’ Amazon store.