I’ve been intrigued by the whole free-diving thing since someone posted the video of that guy going 166m underwater. The question is, what benefit (if any) does hypoxic training (either dynamic / static apnea or traditional hypoxic swim sets) yield in a STRICT PHYSIOLOGICAL sense. I get the value of being comfortable breathing on a “schedule,” but is there a further gain. Breath holding is certainly trainable, but does it actually yield anything to endurance athletes who are not freedivers?
Don’t have any references to quote for you, but my understanding is that there is no benefit from hypoxic training. Nor from those lung exerciser appratuses that are being sold all over the place.
You aren’t by chance a USA cycling coach? Cause Sam sent that out to everyone.
No, I am not a USA cycling coach. I just happen to think freediving is really neat.
This is a good review by one of the best people working in the area of altitude and cardiac performance today.
I worked in a lab as a graduate student that was trying to see whether intermittent hypoxia can make rats hypertensive. It can, and it does so mainly by affecting sympathetic nervous system tone. There is an increasing body of evidence which suggests that baseline sympathetic tone influences performance. My personal opinion is that Live High Train Low (LHTL) improves economy not only through increasing endogenous EPO as has been reported, but also through effects on sympathetic activity. If I were a new exercise phys graduate just starting out, that’s where I’d be focusing. I think it’s an enormously fruitful area of research.
LHTL is effective. Hypoxic TRAINING is not. I would think this applies to apneic hypoxic training as well.
There was a post/or series of articles through US Water Polo a number of years ago, probably '98 or 99. My recollection is that Bruce Wigo sent it out/posted it shortly after pulling his son out of a pool after he tried to swim something like 9 laps underwater in a backyard pool. The upshot of the article, as I recall it, was that there is no physiological benefit and that the risk of something bad happening was far outweighed by any pyschological benefits. I believe the article/post’s target audience was polo coaches, who, like swim coaches, routinely give out hypoxic sets without thinking/knowing about the consequences.
That article states:
(3) rather than intensifying the training stimulus, training at altitude or under hypoxia leads to the opposite effect - reduced speeds, reduced power output, reduced oxygen flux - and therefore is not likely to provide any advantage for a well-trained athlete
So does that mean anything you gain by resting at altitude is offset by training at altitude? Or is it more like, you gain by resting, but do not lose anything by training, so net effect is positive?
Do you think swim sets that extremely deprive you of oxygen (one or two breaths per 50), actually hurt you? How about sets where you breathe every 7th stroke?
I know that the water polo article was not written by you, but you seem like you agree?
Exactly. You cannot train as hard in a hypoxic state, so there are fitness losses. That is why HiLo is so superior. You can train at intensity, and yet get the hypoxic benefits when your system is not under stress.
You have four possible states - HiHi, HiLo, LoHi, and LoLo. Of these, I would say the most advisable are HiLo and LoLo, since you can train the hardest. HiHi is okay, but you really need supplmental O2, like they give during hard sessions at the US Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs. LoHi is not advisable.
Whether I agree or not is probably irrelevant. You guys are operating on a much higher level than I ever will.
Definitely though, Bruce’s article, or at least my recollection of it, would agree with the entry’s on this post. That is, there is no physiological benefit to the training.
Intuitively, I always thought hypoxic sets made no sense, and this goes back to when I was probably 10, because you could always just swim slower to make the reps.
Interestingly, there seems to be NO studies done on hypoxic training and it’s effect on swimming. Or the effect of hypoxic->sprint sets, so your body adapts to CO2 in the muscles. Wonder if that would show different results than the running tests done… Swimming tests in general seem more difficult to do, I guess because technique is so much more of a factor than fitness.
I guess it really shows the importance of specificity. Holding your breath makes you better at holding your breath, and that might be about all is makes you better at…
That’s an interesting point - about the CO2. Drive to breathe in normals is governed more by CO2 than O2 sensitivity. Not so in pathological states like chronic bronchitis (“blue bloater” phenotype). Hypoxic swim sets are apneic by definition (nobody swims with a reduced O2 mixture in a tank as far as I know), and are probably only retraining CO2 drive / control of breathing. So “progress” seen by coaches in terms of how far a person can swim under water probably has more to do with blunted CO2 drive than any kind of improved aerobic / anaerobic endurance.
i was under the impression that just performing max apneas regularly (like sitting on your couch at sea level) could produce increases in VO2. (temporary ones, i think.)
my coach is a triathlete, free diver, and PhD in environmental physiology; he knows more about apnea etc. than anyone else i know, and i seem to think he told me about the max apnea/VO2 thing, once.
will have to ask him - this has me very interested!
-mike
“LoHi is not advisable”
That is not necessarily true in my experience.
http://www.hypoxico.com/images/pdfs/Molec_Adapts_in_skeletal_muscle_to_endurance_training_in_hyp.pdf
EXPOSURE TO ALTITUDE HAS SPECIFIC biological effects in
humans. Continuous residence at moderate heights
On the other hand, when training alone is performed
under hypoxic conditions (e.g., “living low-training
high”), increased mitochondrial densities, capillary-to-
fiber ratios, and fiber cross-sectional areas have been
observed (9). Other studies that used similar training
protocols have demonstrated significant increases in
the activities of oxidative enzymes and in capillary
density (13, 27, 43). In each of these investigations, the
activity of citrate synthase was elevated to a greater
extent after training at the same level of intensity
under hypoxic than under normoxic conditions. One
study revealed a significantly higher myoglobin (Mb)
protein content only after training in hypoxia (43).
After living low-training high, endurance performance
and V? O2 max are improved when tested in normoxia and
in hypoxia (27, 38, 44).
Haim
I recall reading, maybe even on this site about a year ago, that Doc Counsilman did some initial work that indicated that hypoxic sets would give the same benefits as training at altitude. He then used a lot of them for a year. What he found is that swimmers aren’t necessarily as dumb as we seem, and that all his swimmers slowed down to compensate for having less air. So, he concluded that there was no benefit from hypoxic sets.
I do not know if holding your breath does anything for your athletic performance.
In 1971 Doc Counsilman proposed the idea that hypoxic swimming (swimming while restricting your breathing) would simulate training at altitude. Everyone jumping on the bandwagon. I abandoned a high yardage program for a while in favor of restricted breathing. If Counsilman said it was the thing to do, I did it. My teams always improved because I was such a son of a bitch on the deck that they believed whatever I said and worked their asses off.
I also tried it for my swimming and could not focus on my swimming as I was always looking for the next breath.
The next year Counsilman changed his view and said that hypoxic training only raised venous blood pressure and did not simulate training at altitude. Very few coaches read this new insight and continue to use hypoxic training to this day.
I use a center snorkel which makes it harder to get air into my lungs. I have to use more muscle power to suck the air in. i find that when I take the snorkel off I can breathe in all the air in a room.
Keep in mind when you read my stuff it is my interpretation of the world and I could very well be wrong.
DougStern
“”“”“I use a center snorkel which makes it harder to get air into my lungs. I have to use more muscle power to suck the air in. i find that when I take the snorkel off I can breathe in all the air in a room.”“”“”"
Damn, I really want to sit and chat with you sometime but if it’s going to kill me maybe we can do it over the phone. 
Brian,
Check your e-mail.
DougStern
I too have seen the benefits of the center snorkle in the terms you describe. I have seen it in the athletes I have coached (they didn’t like it too much) as well as myself (I didn’t like it either at first).
I think the strength of the musculature of breathing is something that is overlooked in many training philosophies.
It’s all about breath control…
I use a center snorkel which makes it harder to get air into my lungs. I have to use more muscle power to suck the air in. i find that when I take the snorkel off I can breathe in all the air in a room.
Doug,
I highly suggest you contact Dr. Genadijus Sokolovas at USA Swimming (Physiology Director) regarding a document titled “Restricted Breathing Training”. I have the article, but I received it at a USA Swimming/AZ Swimming Coach clinic, and I don’t know about Dr. Sokolovas’s policy in its dissemination. Probably not a big deal, but direct to the source can’t hurt.
The article talks about using the center-mount snorkels as an additional training modality. I’ve been playing with it with some of my older swimmers (17-18), and while it’s interesting, it’s still too short-term to interpret any data I have gathered.
Take care.
Dave