One of my pet topics to teach in underwater rugby is breathing.
People think that it’s not a big deal; you just inhale, exhale, and repeat.
Turns out, there is way more to it. In fact, there is so much more to it, I couldn’t cover it all if this were not a mere blog post, but a series of books on the topic. I also found that most physicians don’t even know most of the breathing fundamentals, as witnessed numerous times when undergoing a breathing test, and being told to exhale forcefully, yet prolongedly -- spoiler: these two are mutually exclusive.
So instead of getting into an argument, I would have some fun.
In a subsequent stress test on a stationary bike, I used breathing to first artificially elevate my heart rate. As the power demand was gradually increased as part of the test, I would again use breathing to slowly push my heart rate downwards compared to what it would be based on demand.
Mind you, I told the physician none of this: he would only see the result. If you have ever done such a test, you expect your heart rate to increase as your power demand goes up, until you reach your maximum allowable heart rate, which is mostly based on your age.
In my case, the resulting heart rate vs. power curve was much flatter than normal, with the theoretical maximum possible power output by far exceeding the limits of the bike. Remember, I am cheating here, in a way, and there is no way I could actually reach that calculated maximum power output.
But the physician’s reaction was rather priceless. I came to repeat this little trick on numerous occasions.
Just to clarify: I’m not a Tibetan monk, nor am I some kind of medical anomaly. I merely figured out how to use breathing for my purpose, rather than being controlled by it.
I learned it myself while playing underwater rugby. It works in martial arts (I was told), long-distance running, and applied psychology. As part of the underwater rugby training, I teach it for warm-up. There are a lot of little nuances to it, as we are still discovering as a team; The last chapter has clearly not yet been written.