This is your Quick Training Tip, a chance to learn how to work smarter in just a few moments so you can get right to your workout.
Walk into just about any gym, and you’ll be confronted with all manner of curious lifting techniques—people swinging weights, using body English, doing “partial” reps, and holding their breath with such red-faced determination that it looks like they’re going to crap their compression shorts.
The goal of all of these methods is to move more weight, but the last one (breath holding) is one of the few with benefits backed by science. Officially, the method is called the Valsalva maneuver, and studies show that it works as advertised—by taking a deep belly breath and holding it forcefully, you crank up your “intra-abdominal pressure” (IAP), increasing the rigidity of your core. A stiffer core not only better supports your spine, but also improves overall stability and power, helping you lift greater loads without a greater risk of injury.
But here’s the thing: Not everyone buys into the idea that the Valsalva maneuver is entirely safe. Sure, it transforms your core from a pliable mass into an unyielding pylon, helping you handle heavier loads, but studies also suggest that the technique can have potentially negative consequences, such as spiking your heart rate and blood pressure and even increasing your risk of cerebral hemorrhage. The evidence supporting these negative effects is far from bulletproof, but seeing as there’s another breathing method that offers the same benefits without the cardiovascular drawbacks, performing the Valsalva maneuver hardly seems worth it for the typical gymgoer.
Your move: Forced exhalation. Take a deep belly breath at the beginning of each rep, and then exhale it forcefully through your teeth as you power through the sticking point of the lift—driving the bar back up from the bottom of a squat or bench press, for example.
Research shows that breathing in this way produces similar increases in IAP and force production as the Valsalva maneuver without increasing the strain on your cardiovascular system.
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