Thursday Thrive: Steal my Breathwork Routine
When I outlined my health & fitness plan for 2024, I mentioned Breathwork was going to be a big part of it.
I didn’t go into too many of the details, but I’m going to do that today.
This is my full breathwork practice based on working with Ed (my breath coach).
Morning breathwork routine
My morning breathwork routine takes me just over 10 minutes.
I like to do it first thing: I wake up, weigh myself, take my water and supplements, and then go straight into a bit of stretching and my breathwork.
I’m approaching breathwork for two general purposes:
General mood, calmness, and performance throughout everyday life
Peak performance for training/athleticism
The first part of my breathwork plan is aimed at reducing anxiety.
It consists of the Physiological Sigh, Box breathing, and Humming Breathing.
The physiological sigh is where you take a deep breath, and then add a short breath on top of your initial one.
The double inhale expands the surface area of the lungs, expels CO2 more efficiently, and slows down heart rate.
I do 10 physiological sighs to start.
(Here’s a demo)
Box breathing
Box breathing is where you:
Inhale for 4 seconds
Hold for 4 seconds
Exhale for 4 seconds
Hold for 4 seconds
The slow 4-second breath hold allows CO2 to build up in the blood. This enhances the vagus nerve and allows you to enter the parasympathetic nervous system.
Then as you exhale, you trigger the parasympathetic nervous system (which makes you feel calm and relaxed).
Humming Breathing
Humming breathing is a way to activate the vagus nerve.
The vagus nerves run from the large intestine to the brain.
They’re the main set of nerves that regulate the parasympathetic nervous system, the “rest and digest state”.
It’s a part of the nervous system that is responsible for mood, immune system, digestion, heart rate, and blood pressure.
Humming can activate the vagus nerve because the nerves run through your larynx and pharynx in the throat.
Stimulating the vagal nerves promotes a strong stress response and increased heart rate variability.
On top of that, humming breathing increases nitric oxide production (as does all nasal breathing).
How to practice humming breathing:
Take a deep inhale in (4+ seconds) and hum through closed lips as you exhale through your nose.
That’s the extent of my morning routine:
10 Physiological sighs
Box breathing for ~5 minutes
10+ Humming breaths
Performance Breathing
Understanding the “BOLT Score”
BOLT stands for body oxygenation level test.
It’s an assessment of how well you can tolerate C02 and how effective your breathing is.
The BOLT score is measured in seconds. Here’s how you do the test:
Take 3 deep breaths.
On the third exhale, plug your nose and close your mouth.
Start your timer.
The number of seconds is your bolt score.
The first time I tried this, I got less than 30 seconds.
I’m not sure if something was going on with me that day, but it was surprisingly (and dishearteningly) low.
I am now at 40 seconds, which is considered a solid range for a healthy adult. I’d like to increase this to be at an elite level, because why not be elite?
To increase my BOLT score, Ed (my coach) has me doing an exercise where I test how many steps I can take with my breath held.
I do this by basically setting up in the same way I would do the BOLT test, except that instead of counting seconds, I walk and count my steps.
I just hit a new personal best of 50 steps this morning.
Nasal Breathing
I’d been on the nasal breathing train for a while now. I’ve been taping my mouth shut at night for some months now, and I wrote about it in a previous edition of the newsletter.
You should be breathing through your nose as much as possible.
Your mouth is for eating, talking, and breathing only during incredibly intense exercise.
Nasal breathing is shown to increase nitric oxide, which has a massive range of benefits in the body.
My protocol for nasal breathing is to:
Tape my mouth shut every night and during periods of work during the day
Ensure my mouth is closed when I’m walking
Push the pace of my Zone 2 cardio with nasal breathing
I’m tracking how much zone 2 cardio I can do with nasal breathing only.
Yesterday, I did 15 minutes at 4 miles per hour on the incline treadmill with nasal breathing only.
That felt pretty hard. I’m going to increase this and start pushing the pace with jogging using only nasal breathing.
The goal here is to increase my C02 tolerance, which will help improve my V02 max score as well as support my other athletic endeavors and hopefully contribute to better health, endurance, and performance on a daily basis.
So my full breathwork routine is:
Morning breathing routine of
Physiological sighs
Box breathing
Humming breathing
Performance breathing
Breath held walking (counting steps)
Small breath holds throughout the day
Nasal breathing only
Nasal breathing when walking
Taping my mouth shut
Hope that helps!
Don’t sleep on breathwork, it’s a relatively low effort HIGH ROI activity for peak performance.
There are tons of resources online (Huberman Lab has some protocols).
And make sure you follow Ed on Twitter and subscribe to his newsletter on Substack!
And if you’re ready to get in the best shape of your life and perform at your peak this year, you know the drill.
Reply to this email with subject “Goals” and we can have a chat.
Talk soon,
Colin