This is killing me on the bike. I get out of a mile swim with a belly full of air. I get on the bike and it moves into my intestines with major cramping. Which hurts when I am in aero.
When I am training I am not able to stop doing it. Is this just poor breathing technique?
I’ve never had that problem, but can see that it could cause quite a problem.
How long have you been swimming? Have you had this problem ever since you began swimming?
Does it happen little by little with every breath, or is it a rogue breath every once in a while?
I am a new swimmer, less than two years. It does seem to be small increments that build up. After a mile or so I am pretty much floating. I have tried to pinpoint when in my breath that it is happening and cant.
While standing I cant swallow air, it seems to be something to being on my side in the water. I take deep breaths when I am going fast, it could be Im breathing to deeply. But I cant feel it happening.
You can’t get air in to your stomach without swallowing. How often do you swallow while swimming? I do it relatively rarely because when I do, I invariably inhale phlegm on the next breath due to sinus drainage.
But when I do backstroke, I submerge my face between each stroke and find that I need to swallow probably twice per 25m.
When swimming freestyle (or all strokes except backstroke) I find myself pushing the water I accumulate back out my lips in to the pool, so that I seldom need to swallow. Can you try this?
I’ve had the same issue before. Last spring we had a splash and sprint here, and I think I swallowed a bunch of air. On the run I had nasty stomach cramps. Not fun at all. Are you nervous? It only seemed to happen to me on race day. I’m not sure if nerves would have anything to do with it or not though.
Good luck!
Mike
Poor breathing technique. When your head is underwater, blow bubbles. A lot of people hold their breath without meaning to and/or realizing what they’re doing.
I dont think it is due to being nervous as I can pretty much fall asleep when Im doing laps. It seems to happen whether I am racing or training. The only thing I can think of is I am inhaling to much and to strongly, forcing me to swallow air. I am not able to feel the air being swallowed.
Either way I am not able to stop it. It may end my tri career since it really is making the bike miserable.
You’re not inhaling too much, the problem is you’re not exhaling enough.
A couple pointers that helped me.
I gave up on breathing every third stroke until I was more comfortable in the water. Try breathing every other stroke.
Whenever your head is moving, blow out your nose. Take your breath and exhale as your head rotates back into the water. Take your strokes, exhale as your head moves from center to the side to breath.
Do not gasp for air. There’s a huge difference between gasping, filling your mouth with air and breathing. The easiest way to realize the difference is practice breathing like you would when swimming, but out of the water. Like on your drive home. Then practice on the side of the pool a few times, then translate it to the pool.
He is exhaling and inhaling an equal volume.
It’s the swallowed volume at issue here. Tough to know whether the presence of air vs. secretions in the mouth is prompting the excessive swallowing. When you swallow your saliva, you will also swallow air.
If it were me, I’d try consciously spitting out saliva and/or air during swimming.
I don’t think I’ve ever experienced this in the pool.
If you are sure you’ve got air in your stomach why not just let loose a few good belches?
Make a couple big burps part of your transition!
I am breathing every other stroke and I may be gasping for air just from the air demand, like running intervals. I am guessing that is where the air is being swallowed. When I try to calm down the inhale, i cant because I need the air.
I am thinking about tigerchiks comment about not exhaling. When I was having problems breathing when I was just starting out, I was breathing in more air than I needed, because I had not exhaled, the result was a lot of burping. Now it is just happening a lot slower and not getting burped out.
Let me see if I can exhale more…
Not very helpful, but this is what triathlete magazine says to do:
It would be great if I could belch or otherwise (cough cough) the extra air but I cant, it does eventually work its way out via the intestinal tract. However, I am not able to get it to come out in T1. It wont come out on the bike and is finally escaping on the run, It is very embarrassing.
Last year I got questioned by the race director for using unauthorized propulsion methods.
I saw one thread that said the girl took tums before the swim and it fixed it for her…some other’s were talking about gas-x…I don’t know, I don’t have this problem. Are you gulping the air as you come up?
Had the same issue and figured out I was “gasping” to much for air during the swim. As I put more focus on my exhale being complete, my intake being smooth and complete, and also keeping my chin tucked when I breathe, the problem seemed to fix itself.
I also found it to be much more of an issue for me when I was swimming intervals for speed rather than when I was just doing laps for a long swim.
I really like the Tums or Gas-X idea…takes the problem out of play completely if it works.
Try changing it up and breathing every third stroke, may give you more time to exhale fully.
Dave,
I have had the same problem but to a lesser degree. It only happens when I do the longer distance stuff or heavy intensity intervals. It was more of an annoyance than a real problem. One race though I noted how long it took for me to burp the air out. Fortunately I only do sprints so get much built up. Looking forward to hear more advice on the subject. Just wanted ya to know you are not the only one.
Cheers,
Paul
Perhaps you are opening your mouth too wide. Try it right now, open your mouth really wide and breath in. You should feel like your throat is more opened up. If you get water back there, which is likely with a wide open mouth, you’ll automatically swallow it and take some air with it. So try just opening your mouth a little, or as much as you need, but not wide open, when you breathe in.
Hmm it works, thats brilliant! I will try that at the pool. I am guessing that in my desire to get the most air I am opening up too wide, maybe its that simple.
Good advice all of it.
Perhaps you are opening your mouth too wide. Try it right now, open your mouth really wide and breath in. You should feel like your throat is more opened up. If you get water back there, which is likely with a wide open mouth, you’ll automatically swallow it and take some air with it. So try just opening your mouth a little, or as much as you need, but not wide open, when you breathe in.