Top Cardio Training Mistake
Fitness:
Work capacity across broad time and modal domains
Health:
Work capacity across broad time and modal domains across a lifetime
Cardiovascular and Respiratory Endurance:
The ability of the body’s systems to gather, process, and deliver oxygen
Stamina:
The ability of body systems to process, deliver, store, and utilize energy
CrossFit:
Constantly varied, functional movements, performed at high intensity
Nutrition:
Eat meat and vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch, and no sugar.
Keep intake to levels that will support exercise but not body fat.
In order to improve our Fitness and Health over time, then we have to be balanced in our capacities and abilities of our 10 General Physical Skills. How we can be more balanced, and improve our capacities and abilities of our 10 General Physical Skills, is by doing CrossFit.
Above the foundation of Nutrition in the Theoretical Hierarchy of Development is Metabolic Conditioning.
Metabolic Conditioning as what Greg Glassman wrote in June 2003 in the CrossFit Journal: “Metabolic training refers to conditioning exercises intended to increase the storage and delivery of energy for any activity.”
With that, when we do CrossFit, we do Metabolic Conditioning to improve both our Cardiovascular and Respiratory Endurance and Stamina, the first two of the 10 General Physical Skills.
When most people do Metabolic Conditioning, the most glaring mistake they make is that how they breathe does not match with given session/activity/exercise they are doing.
Most people start huffing and puffing through their mouth from the start of their session/activity/exercise, especially at lower intensities for longer durations of time. By using the wrong hole (the mouth instead of the nose) to breathe from the start, they already bypass their ability to use fat for energy (“Why does nasal breathing promote fat loss?”). The idea is to use fat for energy as their primary fuel source, from rest, through lower intensities, for as long as possible, and through increasing intensities until they need switch to their secondary fuel source of carbohydrates at higher intensities.
For example, observing any group of humans (ignorant to breathing correctly) moving and exercising, usually their breath frequency, breath volume, as well as their overall breathing technique, are most of the time incorrectly matched for the low intensity activity they are choosing to do. In other words, they breathe too many times in a given amount of time, too much (hyperventilation), and even breathing too shallowly (chest breathing). They are already losing their maximum capacity of use and their improvement of their Cardiovascular and Respiratory Endurance and Stamina in that:
1. the Bohr Effect of the decreasing affinity of red blood cells’ hemoglobin to oxygen molecules (O2) is blunted. In the presence of increasing levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) and protons (H+, acidity), especially in active skeletal muscle cells, oxygen molecules are more readily let go from the hemoglobin molecules that are on red blood cells to be taken up by the skeletal muscle cells. When the abovementioned group of humans are huffing and puffing (breathing too frequently and too much), they are exhaling out too much of the CO2 that their red blood cells need to be in the presence of in order to effectively deliver their O2 to their skeletal muscle cell counterparts.
2. the use of nasal nitric oxide (NO) is blunted. By bypassing the nose to breathe, the same group of humans huffing and puffing through their mouth are not properly taking NO from their nasal passages down into their lungs and blood vessels to vasodilate and reduce pulmonary resistance. By breathing through the nose first, this same group of humans would be able to keep their airways and blood vessels more open, to allow for more air and blood to be circulated easier. As a result of their huffing and puffing through their mouth, they are constricting their airways and blood vessels.
3. the use of their diaphragm is blunted. The muscle that exists below the lungs contracts and relaxes when we inhale and exhale, respectively. When the group of huffing and puffing humans are shallowly, or chest breathing, they are not effectively using their diaphragm to let their lungs fully expand and contract. As a result, not enough air is inhaled and exhaled. When this group of huffing and puffing humans are running, for example, they are more prone to get side aches/side stiches because their diaphragm is not working correctly from their shallow/chest breathing.
What would be the proper protocol, or process, to follow for this group of exercising humans?
First, it would be to learn how to use their bodies better to breathe. By positioning their bodies better at rest and in movement/exercise while inhaling and exhaling properly, feeling their diaphragm work fully, allows their lungs to contract and relax properly for the most air to be inhaled and exhaled, respectively.
Second, they can learn and apply the Breathing Gears, as outlined in the videos below (what they are and how to use them, and in practice, and in motion).
If they, and most importantly, we, focus on using this system of progressively increasing use of our nose and mouth in our movement/exercise, then they and we can more effectively use the macronutrients of fat and carbohydrates that already exist in our bodies at the right times and at the right intensities. By breathing correctly and matching the use of the right holes and at different rates and volumes at different intensities of our Metabolic Conditioning, then we become more balanced in our capacities of any and all of our energy systems (Aerobic and Anaerobic), thereby improving our Cardiovascular and Respiratory Endurance and Stamina, which helps us improve our Fitness and overall Health.