G'Day ladies and gents I'm trying to increase the amount of time I can hold my breath for (this is for swimming, BTW) and I was wondering, what cardio can help? Thanks in advance.
Ok so you want to get better at holding your breath, specifically for swimming. Not being a swim coach, I would recommend you practice holding your breath for long periods of time (inhale and exhale fully a few times, then take a full breath and hold it for a long time), and swimming, with focus on keeping your head under the water all the time. Any type of anaerobic training would also help you to perform better when your body is not getting as much oxygen as it is using up.
x2 Practice holding your breath and it should become easier. Cardio does not increase lung capacity. In fact almost nothing increases lung capacity. The only slightly trainable thing about the entire respiratory system is some respiratory muscles, including the diaphragm and the muscles in between your ribs.
Swimming itself is supposed to be one of the best ways to increase lung capacity. Running and meditation breathing exercises are others. It's a long term goal sort of thing. It can be dangerous to work intensely to increase it in a short amount of time. Keep swimming and your lung capacity will increase.
Lung capacity can not be regarded as V02max. They are NOT the same thing and have almost no relation to one another. The maximal amount of air your lungs can hold has little relation to the ability of your muscles to take up and use oxygen (which is what V02max tests measure). Lyle Mcdonald has a great series of articles on HIIT and steady state. http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/category/training/endurance-training HIIT and steady state cardio are both effective at increasing V02max. One is only better than the other depending on your final goals. To blankly state HIIT is better is misinformed.
As i said before. Lung capacity does not change with training. Your fitness will, but that has nothing to do with lung capacity. Lung capacity is largely genetically determined and is related to height and body size. Lung capacity is pretty irrelevant in terms of sports performance anyway as the lungs are overdeveloped for the needs of the human body. The only people that may find lung capacity is a limiting factor in their performance are elite athletes such as tour de france cyclists and ultra-marathon runners. However even for them the topic of insufficient lung capacity is controversial.
You can increase your lung capacity with training. You can also increase your lung capacity with breathing exercises.
No. Read this: http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=if-a-persons-lung-size-ca It's a response from an associate professor of health to a question. It gives a good run down of fitness and lung capacity. Take particular note of the second paragraph. If you are still a believer that exercise increases lung capacity, pick up a decent exercise physiology textbook and have a read. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_g...ks&field-keywords=exercise+physiology&x=0&y=0
OK. according to the sources above, your lungs will not grow any larger if you train in swimming or running or do breathing exercises. I took the OP to be inquiring whether or not he/she could improve the quality of his/her lung capacity. "Increasing Lung Capacity" is a common topic when it comes to training. I'm under the impression that it has been widely accepted that a person "increasing lung capacity" is actually trying to improve their cardiovascular training - so they feel comfortable, not stressed, in high cardio activities. Literally, perhaps it scientifically impossible to grow your lungs larger, but in regular training discussion, when someone asks a question about increasing their lung capacity, they are wanting to improve the quality of their breathing and lung function for a given activity. Tell me if I'm wrong, I've heard and read the phrase "increasing lung capacity" many times and the ensuing discussion was lung strength, breathing quality, the ability to take in more air and retain it longer or the ability to run for long distances without breathing difficulties.
Thanks. In that case, try inhaling half of your capacity and holding for a few counts. Instead of exhaling, inhale a quarter of the remaining half, and hold for a few more counts. Don't exhale, inhale the final quarter, and hold. When you have to exhale, only exhale one-eighth of your retention, and inhale to full capacity again. Breath this way for a few minutes and then release it all. I enjoy triathalons. I find this breathing exercise helps me.
I agree with what you are saying. It is common for people to try to say they want 'increase their lung capacity' when they mean they want to improve fitness. It's unfortunate, because it often leads to people doing exercise that is not going to benefit their sport performance, or actually get them fitter. Being fitter is what makes a person find an exercise easier. For the record, the OP's question was actually answered by Yohan in the second post. The thread did take a different direction then, but his question had been answered. To the OP: you could also look up methods that free-divers use to help increase the time they hold their breath. The best free divers can hold their breath for well over 5 minutes. The record for static breath holding being just over 10 minutes.
If even you could significantly increase lung size, it probably wouldnt be a good idea. In highschool I had a friend who's lungs were too large for his chest, eventually a blister developed (I think from rubbing agaisnt his ribs, I may be wrong) on one of his lungs. I remember he kept complaining about a pain in his chest. He passed out at track practice and had to undergo surgery on his lung.
