The REAL Reason You Can't Run Faster: How To Breathe When Running

Sport Scientists Devlin Eyden, Shona Hendricks & Lindsey Parry discuss the correct way to breathe while running and if the amount of oxygen you're not getting is actually the reason you can't run faster.

When you're ready, we'd love to help you become a better runner:

In this video:
00:00 Introduction
00:16 Nose or mouth breathing while running?
01:39 3 Ways to Improve your breathing while running
01:48 Rhythmic breathing for runners
03:25 Belly breathing for runners
04:11 Box breathing for runners (4 sided breathing)
05:30 Do nasal dilators help you run better?
06:30 The BEST way to improve your breathing for running

[michealGRuns]

There’s a book called “Breathe” by James Nestor that really changed my understanding of breathing. I now find myself feeling “out of breathe” if I mouth breathe - I do all my breathing (inhale AND exhale) exclusively nasally

[Kelly_Ben]

Thanks for the tips! As an asthmatic runner, I spend much more time thinking about my breathing than non asthmatics. Switching to MAF and focusing on nasal breathing - incredibly challenging at first- made a HUGE difference for me. I rarely ever need my inhaler anymore! Sadly, speed fell by the wayside, so I'm trying to incorporate that back in now while keeping the benefits from MAF.

[thepsychologist]

I'm 52 years old and still under 90 mins for the HM. All my life I've been a mouth breather while running. It's never hampered my performance and I've never had any ill-effects from it.

[SamsaraRevolves]

I breathe between a 6 x 6 and a 2 x 2 cadence, and everything in between, including alternating patterns depending on level of effort. Anything less than 5 x 4 is easy effort for me. 3 x 3 tends to correlate with threshold and 2 x 2 is anaerobic. This works great for me to regulate efforts in training and races.

[StefanvanderFange]

I've changed to nasal breathing about a month ago. Even on tempo sessions, I can still at least breathe in through the nose. Now I prefer it, because nasal breath is just cleaner and better than oral breathing. On rhythm: I like 3 steps in, 4 steps out for easy runs and 2 in 3 out on speed sessions.

[paulvinwebster]

Ive been applying Rhythmic technique for years but wow never thought to alternate the breathing pattern before.
Applying from today onwards !
Thanks Coach Parry and team !

[davegaleuk]

'Ripple breathing' was de rigeur in the Seventies. The word at the time was that you couldn't break the 4 minute mile without ripple breathing. I still use it, without any conscious thought. It sounds very similar to belly breathing referenced in the video

[greglane]

I learned as a young runner that my breathe had to match my pace or I would get side stitches in the middle of a run or race so now that I'm 58 my breathe and stamina has to match with my pace to keep running and it takes practice.

[mikewoodd]

It's very difficult to run out of oxygen, we will normally pass out first, and showing symptoms of hypoxia (blue lips etc) while exercising is surely more a sign of illness. Yes if heart rate is higher than normal, it's driven up by lower oxygen level, and maybe low Iron or bad lung function (asthma). But feeling short of breath is more from excess carbon dioxide. As O2 drives heart rate, CO2 drives respiration rate. Feeling shorter of breath than normal and needing to breath faster may be a sign of something else. The other side of breathing - conversion transport and elimination of CO2 - is predominantly effected by carbonic anhydrases of which Zinc is the active element. In other words - keeping up your Iron intake is important - but personally I find keeping up Zinc intake even more so.

[leftyseel]

Isn't exhaling on two strides exhaling on both the left and right?

[ioriroger]

I'm Asian with a small nose, I can't run without opening my mouth to breathe 🤣

[JulAlxAU]

Good luck breathing through your nose when running!

[rgh]

I have an idea, let's get back to running for fun and not worry about what side of the body I'm exhaling from! What's next, the position of my tongue in my mouth while I run?

[DJKNUF]

The video isn't giving proper answer to the question in the title...