You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the fist step.
Martin Luther King
It is a dilemma most of us will face at least once a day – stairs or lift? When I arrive at work in the morning, I admit, I go for the lift. Some people see stairs as a personal challenge “How fast can I climb them?”; some see them as a fitness goal “Take the stairs contribute to my general fitness”; some (most?) see it as a pain “Why would I do it and arrive upstairs sweeting and breathless?”. Well, here’s the thing: general stamina/physical fitness and climbing stairs are not actually related! You can be a marathon runner or a professional sprinter and still be breathless after a flight of stairs. Why is that?
When you approach stairs with the intention to go up as quickly as possible or with a specific goal in mind (i.e., your running late, it’s a fitness challenge), your brain will send a message to your lungs to slow down your breathing, nay even hold your breath altogether. Right, well done brain. People looked into this a bit more and research showed that it has actually nothing to do with stairs per se. Then what is it due to? When you approach a task with a specific aim in time (e.g., darting up the stairs), it triggers the “concentration on small task” program in the brain. This program has been identified not only in humans, but also in apes and other close relative species.
The concentration on small task program happening in the brain seems to trigger a variety of physiological changes when focussing on specific task, including changes in brain waves and heart rate deceleration. If it is not too much of a problem when focussing on mental calculation, painting, or delict tasks, it can become problematic when happening while producing an intense physical effort. The idea behind this slow breathing seems to reduce peripheral distraction and parasite/background movements (because breathing does involve some movements of the thoracic cage and other body parts) in order to keep the body still for the precision task at hand. A lot of athletes involved in throwing darts, shooting riffles, or archery enter a quiet concentration mindset by slowing down their breathing. By doing so, they are preparing themselves for taking a shot and enter the concentration on small task challenge. It also works before threading a needle or drawing delicate patterns.
For some people, it goes even further: when engaging in an activity necessitating momentary intense concentration, they just stop breathing altogether for a short period of time. And it might happen more often then you think! See, “momentary intense concentration” will be needed for different tasks depending on your own activities; you could find yourself in apnoea (suspension of breathing), while typing (I do need to remind myself to breath while writing my posts), looking for something around your desk, reading something quickly, preparing dinner, or drinking (it is advise to stop breathing during that one, speaking from experience…). It can happen during occasional/uncommon activities, like sewing, calligraphy, lifting up something, or fantasising about the things you’ll do when you’ll get time off (one day…).
Now, the results of slowing/holding your breathing before an intense physical exercise is that you are left breathless. It is not rocket-deduction, and not even rocket-science. It is actually biology 1.0.1. When you slow your breathing down, the oxygen intake reduces. However, the short, intense physical effort will consume a lot of energy and oxygen (how those two are linked is a story for another day). So, your muscles take all the oxygen available, and find a way to produce even more energy, in order to complete that thing you absolutely want to do, like climbing the stairs super fast. As a result, the level of oxygen in your blood reduces drastically, while the level of carbon dioxide increases (lungs take oxygen and reject carbon dioxide as a biological waste). Because the carbon dioxide level increases, the brain is made aware of the oxygen deficit and will work to restore balance, ordering the lungs to breath more and the heart to beat faster (knowing the brain is the one telling the lungs to breath less and the heart to slow down in the first place..). Therefore, once we’re done with our personal challenge and start breathing normally again, we are in need of more oxygen, hence breathless, and our heart beats faster, hence flushed.
How to prevent it? Here’s an idea: don’t be late so you won’t need rushing up the stairs!
Hmm, yeah right… Ok more seriously, next time you are about to consciously engage in a short-but-intense physical activity (like running up the stairs), instead of letting your brain take over try and take deep breaths before engaging in said activity. This will increase the oxygen concentration in the blood, making more oxygen available for the effort, hence preventing the oxygen draught post-effort. Use your breath during the effort, remember it is your ally and not some background disturbance. It might feel like you are forcing yourself at first, as you would literally be going against your nature. But if you keep doing it before any intense effort, it might become a habit and you won’t need to think about it… and you won’t be breathless afterward!
Who’s up for a sprint up the stairs?
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