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Is Breathing Important?

Breathing is so important for any athlete, especially injured athletes if they want to have their best recovery. I want to provide an introduction to my Top 5 breathing techniques that I believe everyone should know. For Injured athletes, proper breathing can help reduce pain, improve mobility, and speed up (potentially) the healing process. Also, regulating the flow of oxygen and reducing stress and anxiety, breathing exercises can help athletes heal more quickly and efficiently.

How should we be breathing?

If you have the ability go and observe an infant or toddler breathing. Notice what part of their body is moving…chest or stomach? You should see their stomach moving. This is our basic instinct. This is what allows us to take the deepest breath and get the most oxygen into our system. However, as we grow we lose this ability and we start breathing through our chest. We need to re-learn natural instincts for our body to have a better recovery. It should be easy to breathe into our bellies and not into our chests; but, we struggle with doing this. We need to use our diaphragms to breathe rather than our chest muscles.

There are 5 breathing techniques that I have learned that tend to work the best for athletes. Why do they work? Firstly, they are easy to understand. Secondly, they are easy to replicate at home. Thirdly, they can be done anywhere (mostly). Lastly, they are effective.

THE TOP 5

#5 FOCUSED BREATHING

Focused breathing is more like meditative breathing. This would be where you sit in a quiet room, with your eyes closed, and just breathe. This is a time to feel the air coming into your body and then the air leaving your body. Breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth. This is the hardest technique on this list. If you are not good at breathing into your belly you won’t be able to do this for an extended period.

An example of this that you may have heard of is square breathing. A 3-second inhale, a 3-second hold, a 3-second exhale, and then another 3-second hold. And then repeat this for a few minutes and increase that time as you get better. Below is a youtube video that I like to show athletes for visual instruction. In the video, there is a 5-second count. You can increase or decrease that depending on your ability.

#4 DIAPHRAGMATIC BREATHING

This is another example of a breathing technique that is taught a lot by mental coaches/therapists, physical therapists, athletic trainers, and doctors. This type of breathing is where you sit or stand and place one hand on your chest and the other on your stomach. With your eyes closed your focus is on moving the hand that is on your stomach not on your chest. This gives you a physical sense of where your breath is going. As you get better it should be easier for you to move your stomach and not your chest. With this technique, you are also breathing in through your nose and out your mouth.

#3 ALLIGATOR/CROCODILE BREATHING

These final three breathing techniques are hard concepts to grasp. But, I believe that they are the most beneficial and most intuitive for the brain to get back to the basics of breathing. Alligator or crocodile breathing is performed by lying on the floor on your stomach with your forehead resting on your hands. As usual, breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth. What you are focused on is pushing your stomach into the floor and expanding your back toward the ceiling with every breath. Perform a 4-6 second breath in, a 2-second hold, a 4-6 second exhale, and then another 2-second hold. Similar to diaphragmatic breathing the feeling of the floor gives you a sense of where to breathe. The plus of this breathing is you engage the whole core to breathe and don’t just rely on the diaphragm.

#2 360 BREATHING

360 breathing is much like alligator breathing. However, the main difference is that you can be in any position for this technique (sitting, standing, or lying on your back). Use the same cadence a 4-6 second breath in, a 2-second hold, a 4-6 second exhale, and then another 2-second hold. With the technique also put your hands around your stomach. Place your fingers towards your belly button and your thumb on the small of your back. Your thoughts should be pushing your hands out with each inhale and then relaxing with each exhale. You can also focus on individual areas of breathing. Examples would be just fingers, just thumbs, right hand, left hand, or individual fingers or thumbs.

#1 WALL BUG BREATHING

Finally, my favorite breathing exercises to do with injured athletes. I recently started to use this technique regularly. I try to teach this exercise to every patient if they are an athlete or not that is how important it is to me. This is a combination of simplicity and effectiveness. The advantage of this technique compared to the other ones is that we are going to distract the brain so that you don’t have to focus as hard on what the body is doing.

The easiest way to start is lying on your back with your hand above your head pushing up against a wall, a couch, or whatever is going to provide resistance. But, if you are unable to lie on your back you can sit or stand and push down on a table or against a wall. You can also progress to having your legs up in a 90-90 position. From there do heel taps, extend your legs, or hold in a leg-extended position.

If you have done a dead bug core exercise this is the basic version that is focused on breathing. Like all other techniques breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth. Instead of holding for a second count, I like to hold for a breath count. Usually, I have athletes start with 3 breaths as a rep and then increase as able. Also, with this one, the focus is on expanding the whole stomach. So, push your back into the floor, expand your sides out, and push your chest towards the ceiling.

Final thoughts

In summary, breathing through the stomach is important because it allows for a full and efficient exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide, reduces stress and anxiety, improves circulation and oxygen flow, and promotes posture and spinal alignment. By incorporating diaphragmatic breathing into their routine, injured athletes can take steps to support their healing and promote overall health and wellness. So, Learn to breathe. I don’t care how you do it but do it early. These 5 breathing techniques are great for all athletes. I like wall bug breathing as I learned it. I believe that it is the most efficient and takes the least amount of thinking. But, everyone is different and one of the others may work better for you. I will also be going into why having good breathing techniques and why breathing is so important in my next article. So, come back.

*Disclaimer*

With your individual injury, some of these may create pain. If that is the case stop, ask whoever you are working with if it is okay, and proceed with their recommendation. Also, ask their opinion on if one might be best for your current state of healing.