Eugenio Alafaci kneels on his hands, eyes closed, back bent into a hollow back. He lets the air out of his throat with a quiet gasp. Next to him, his team-mate Fabio Felline is lying on his forearms, holding his breath, his eyes wide open. What at first glance looks like a somewhat strange yoga class is actually training to breathe at the highest level - an elementary component of the Trek-Segafredo training camp at the start of every cycling season.
A trainer for breathing
Dr Mike Maric is the trainer for the professional cyclists. The former apnoea diver is the breathing coach for the pros of the Italian-American World Tour team. After ending his freediving career, Maric dedicated himself to training in the Italian Swimming Federation, among other things, before joining Trek-Segafredo in 2016.
"In cycling, everyone talks about muscle training, nutrition and regeneration, but very few people think about good breathing technique," says Maric. One of the central topics of his work is increasing lung volume. Maric believes that professional cyclists still have some catching up to do in this area: "Road cyclists are Lung volume five to six litres is normal, but free divers have shown that you can easily reach eleven to twelve litres with the right technique." Breathe better, perform better, is Maric's credo, who sees potential for improvement of up to four per cent in the well-trained professional cyclists through Breath control.
Breathing exercises for road cyclists
1. learn to control your breath
This is how it works: Visualise your breath with the help of a sheet of paper. Hold the paper against the wall just by breathing. Make sure you breathe out evenly and lift your abdomen. Abdominal breathing helps to strengthen the diaphragm. If necessary, adjust the distance to the wall: the further away you stand, the more forcefully you need to breathe. Alternatively, the exercise also works with a curtain that you keep moving with your breath. In both cases, the aim is to regulate your exhalation in order to lengthen the breathing cycle.
Mike Maric: "Most people, including athletes, have no feeling for their breathing because breathing is a matter of course. Visualising your breathing is good preparation for all other exercises."
2. practise diaphragmatic breathing
Here's how it works: Lie on your back on the floor and place a book on your belly button. Breathe in and out through your nose only. The book should rise and fall noticeably with each breathing cycle. Let your breathing become calmer and steadily reduce your breathing rhythm for around three to four minutes - until you are breathing in less oxygen than you are used to. Stop the exercises if your breathing muscles tense up or you lose your breathing rhythm.
Mike Maric: "The exercise prepares you for the strain of the race, where you often have to adjust your breathing rhythm. Breathing with the diaphragm is easier at the beginning if the leg muscles are not strained."
3. find the breathing sweet spot
This is how it works: Now it's time to get on the bike. Warm up in the basic area, breathing only through your nose. Then gradually increase your speed until you start breathing through your mouth to get enough air. Reduce the speed a little and try to find the point (Maric calls it the "sweet spot") at which you can ride as fast as possible using only your nose. Avoid hectic breathing!
Mike Maric: "During exercise, the body continuously absorbs more carbon dioxide. Riding on the threshold from nose to mouth breathing thus simulates the effect of a breathing mask to a certain extent."
4. perform under oxygen deficiency
This is how it works: Warm up for 10 to 15 minutes. Stop the air supply through your mouth and nose, for example using a clothes peg. Continue at the same speed without breathing. Important: Do not maximise breath holding, as you should only be able to recover with the help of nasal breathing. Repeat the exercise up to ten times per journey. IMPORTANT: This exercise puts significantly more strain on the body than the other breathing exercises. Therefore, only start interval training when you have a BOLT value of more than 20 seconds!
Mike Maric: "The important thing is not to hold your breath for as long as possible, but rather to pay off the oxygen debt using only nasal breathing. This results in more effective oxygen transport in the blood in just a few days."
The BOLT test
How well you breathe and whether your breathing improves as a result of the exercises is shown by the Body Oxygen Level Test (BOLT). The test determines how long you can go without breathing. For most people, this is less than 20 seconds. The aim of the exercises is to optimise your breathing so that you can Tolerance to carbon dioxide in the blood and can go more than 40 seconds without taking another breath. Mike Maric: "The advantage for cyclists is obvious: if you have a high BOLT value, you don't have to breathe during a sprint to supply your muscles with oxygen." Important: Exhale in a controlled manner before holding your breath, then hold your breath!
