👋 Hey. Welcome to issue #61 of The Everyday Athlete Newsletter.
Here are my 3 favourite ideas, learns and resources to help you improve your performance this week (3.5 min read):
💪 Power breathing: an instant 10% strength boost
What I was taught about breathing when lifting weights can be summed up by "inhale as you go down, exhale as you go up".
The fact that Bruce Lee used to say that martial arts rely more on “breath strength” than “body strength” might give us a clue that we’re missing something here.
Described in Russian science as the pneuma-muscular reflex, and in Western science as the muscle-breath interaction, we can increase strength through the breath.
Here's how it works:
1. 👋 If you brace like someone’s about to slap you in the gut, it creates pressure around your core, known as intra-abdominal pressure.
2. 📡 This pressure is detected by special nerve cells called baroreceptors (they start sending signals throughout the body trying to control blood pressure).
3. 🔥 So we get this increase in nerve signalling. We’ve excited the nervous system. And so the nerve cells supplying our muscles fire harder. And we get an increase in strength.
So the pressure creates the power.
Kinda like when you beat Verstappen, get on the F1 podium, and put your thumb over the hole to spray the bubbly everywhere. The pressure creates the power.
We can activate our pneuma-muscular reflex in the gym through “power breathing”.
A little grunt or groan works perfectly to force the brace.
(doesn’t matter if after the brace you hold your breath or it slowly seeps out)
It’s why boxers hiss when they strike. And tennis players grunt when they hit. It’s not just carry-on. There’s accessing their breath strength.
You could also scream. A 1961 study found shouting during exertion gave a 12.2% strength boost. But don't be surprised if you have to pay extra next flight for all the carry-on.
If you're not fussed about increasing strength, creating this kind of pressure around your core will also help protect your spine in any kind of lift.
Note: high-tension/power breathing techniques aren't the go for people with heart and blood pressure issues.
Go well.
📆 Article: "I Did A Plank Every Day For 120 Days. Here’s What Happened."
Fun is probably the best starting point for a new habit.
If it's fun/enjoyable, you're more like to do it and stick with it.
But sometimes there’s no way to flip it. It's not fun, you just gotta do it.
This is a smart-ass’ take on doing the things we know we should.
🥇 Inputs = outputs
I'm constantly awed by world-class athletes.
They put down times and performances that are hard to comprehend.
- 🏃 Kelvin Kiptum’s 2:00:35 marathon
- 🏋 Lauren Weeks' 59:27 at the Hyrox World Champs
- 🏊 Michael Phelps' 23 Olympic golds
Their outputs are insane.
But then you look at the inputs...
- 🏃 Kiptum runs 300km a week
- 🏋 Weeks trains for nearly 3 hours every single day
- 🏊 Phelps swam 80km a week
Also insane.
And then it starts to make a bit more sense.
See, there’s no magic pill to world-class performance.
It’s often just a shit load of hard work over an extended period of time.
So instead of purely admiring their ability. Maybe we need to admire their commitment a bit more.
Cause then it's easier to reverse engineer the formula (to the degree that suits us) when we’re chasing hard goals.
That's it!
Have a great weekend 🤙
Matt
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The Everyday Athlete Newsletter is not a licensed health service and is not a substitute for professional health advice, treatment or assessment. The information given in this email is general in nature, written for a specific audience. If you’re struggling, please see a healthcare professional.
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