![]() However, I'd offer that the intensity and workload you could achieve without the mask would be of much higher quality and allow for more adaptation than any training you would achieve with it. By restricting oxygen, you're making your body work much harder at any given workload. Undoubtedly, hypoxic training will feel harder than usual-your heart rate will be higher, you'll breathe harder, and you'll have a higher lactate response at submaximal exercise. By training in a hypoxic environment, and not changing partial pressure as altitude would, all you're doing is improving the strength and endurance of your respiratory system. But in an athletic population? Not so much.Įndurance performance is not limited by the amount of air you get it's limited by the amount of oxygen in that air, and how you use it. It can bring about improvements in inspiratory muscle strength and endurance and exercise performance. Inspiratory muscle training is an incredibly effective and well-utilized tool in people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). This is essentially restricted-air training, also called "inspiratory muscle training." Imagine trying to run while breathing through a straw, or with the aforementioned pillow strapped to your face. In fact, there's not a single person with a shred of physiology knowledge who will support elevation masks' ability to increase hemoglobin.Įlevation masks don't change the partial pressure of incoming air all they do is simply reduce the total amount of airflow to the lungs. The reduced partial pressure of air at altitude is much different than restricting air intake by using a mask. Most importantly, results from studies examining training and performance adaptations from simulated hypoxic environments are mixed at best, with most showing no benefit of hypoxic training. The downside to training at altitude, however, is that any physiological adaptations usually fade within 3-4 weeks. At this point, there may be some benefits to be gained for the endurance athlete, such as increased hemoglobin concentration, increased capillary density, increased mitochondrial volume and elevated buffering capacity. ![]() If you train at altitude long enough, you become adapted to the lower partial pressure. These adaptations could most certainly give you a performance advantage. When the body is exposed to lower partial pressure at altitude (say you go from training at Venice Beach to Colorado Springs), it responds by increasing myoglobin/hemoglobin content and capillary density, and consequently increasing oxygen transport to muscles. Consequently, there's a reduced oxygenation of the blood, which leads to less oxygen being transported to and utilized by working muscles. The air is simply thinner, which is why breathing at high altitudes is more difficult. The partial pressure of oxygen, or the total units of oxygen per given area, is also reduced. Why do elevation masks not simulate altitude? At high altitudes, the atmospheric pressure is reduced. This usage makes their value even more dubious. In addition, some people wear them while performing anaerobic workouts like resistance training, which utilizes a completely different energy system that doesn't even require oxygen. While some users proclaim they can breathe better after using an altitude mask, I bet if I jammed a pillow down someone's throat and asked him to run a mile, he'd be able to breath much better once I took it away, too.ĭamning jokes aside, the sad truth is that altitude masks simply don't simulate high altitude. According to Alex Viada, a successful hybrid-training coach and founder of Complete Human Performance, such high-altitude devices "simulate altitude in the same way sticking your head in a toilet simulates swimming." Ouch.
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