Paul_nl wrote:bobalou wrote:Never heard of that.
That's funny.
But, I know you can do breathing exercises to strengthen your lungs and use techniques to improve oxygen intake.
But for increasing performance on the bike. It will not help... Your lungs are NOT the weakest part of the chain. And the chain will only be stronger when the weakest spot(s) are becoming stronger.
Your blood is after it passed the lungs saturated with 100% of oxygen. And you can't improve it to 101%
The only performance increase with better breathing. Is that you have the same ventilation but you use less energy for breathing. But that is a very small different. Exept when you are breathing very wrong....
What an absolute crock. Why do you think you pant? It is because you can't absorb enough oxygen at your curent rate of breathing to satisfy your needs. SO exercise your lungs ( any physical effort will do this - does not need to be specific ) and you increase your vital capacity ( i.e. can get more air in per breath ) and exercise your heart simultaneously so that it pumps more blood per beat RATHER than beating faster and you have a more efficient system. So at a full exertion, you breathe to the max, your heart is at its max, and you are supplying the max amount of oxygen to your muscles
for your current state of fitness. Get fitter - lo and behold, you can do more.
The story with muscles and oxygen is partly true - there is a limit to the rate of oxygen uptake. Without getting too technical, this is where the VO2 max comes in. This is pretty much a fixed genetic thing. You can increase your efficiency( read fitness) up to your VO2 max. Any further demands on your muscles mean anaerobic metabolism i.e. without oxygen. The body's capacity for this can also be increased by training - high intensity workouts - but it is never as efficient as aerobic.
But believe it, you can vastly improve your lung function by training.
And no, apples don't help