breathing

Can anybody offer breathing insight? I am finding that I inhale and exhale while stroking on each side (during a hard and fast paddle).

The in through the nose and out the mouth wisdom
apparently really helps with removal of lactic acid ( the guys
I am paddling with here swear by it), but to be honest,
I'm always at risk of falling out when the things I have to think about
number more than 1 or 2!!
Sometimes you can use breathing rates to help find your rhythm when paddling.
Inhale 2 strokes, exhale following two strokes on a technique session for example.
Im afraid i haven't given you much of an insight though:(

Thanks Nordy, kinda like running, I'll try that. It's just that each side is a power stroke so I would imagine exhaling each stroke but the rate is too fast so I should take your advice.

When your not thinking about breathing, that's when you know your breathing is correct. Just a thought anyway. Is think the key to anything really is to just relax.

Haha Jordan, when you're always breathing so hard, it's impossible not to think about breathing. maybe I'm doing it all wrong?

I find myself exhaling on the same side when going very hard which may lead to a strength imbalance so I try to switch it around. I found this blog on paddlers breathing which is a good read www.coachingevolution.com.au/blog/2013/0...rformance-breathing/

Paddling k1 this morning doing 8 minute intervals. Was breathing in and exhaling on same side. Will report back if this is the same in shorter intervals. Really interesting subject though! I know breathing is really important in running, but its hard to compare as when paddling you are in a position that doesn't allow for full expansion of the thorasic cavity ( ribs,lungs, intercoastal muscles etc)

Jordan wrote: Paddling k1 this morning doing 8 minute intervals. Was breathing in and exhaling on same side. Will report back if this is the same in shorter intervals. Really interesting subject though! I know breathing is really important in running, but its hard to compare as when paddling you are in a position that doesn't allow for full expansion of the thorasic cavity ( ribs,lungs, intercoastal muscles etc)

Humans evolved so that cadence and respiration are not directly linked so should not be that big an issue in running, compared to say a cheetah where cadence equals respiration...

My concern is with matching breathing and cadence constantly during intervals. In some sports the athlete exhales as the apply maximum force to what they are doing. I found that when I exhaled I was more likely to be pulling harder with that stroke.
I have since tried to focus on switching the breathing/stroke cadence to my non dominant side during intervals so I work my non dominant side harder.

I don't know how much overall difference this makes to speed?

Thought about this on todays paddle, it really depends on how hard I'm going, sometimes there is no rythm between effort and breathing, sometimes I'm stroking both sides on the in breath then breathing out over the next 2-3 strokes, I used to find that my breathing was more in time when I used to count strokes but now that I have a cadence monitor my breathing and cadence are independent of one another. I do know that my breathing is a lot deeper and slower after several months of building up with slower than usual LSD training over the winter and my heart rate is also a lot lower for effort.

I have been doing 5 minute intervals at full blow and a pretty high cadence (for me, at least) and I am forced to take shallow breaths, inhale and exhale each and every stroke. Seems a little inefficient, huh? It's almost like the breathing a woman does when she's giving birth, makes me laugh sometimes as I'm paddling in the middle of the ocean.